A Curse Between Us
by Netherwood
Summary: Homura presides over her new world, but a paradise built on sin cannot endure. Sayaka struggles, Madoka slumbers, and curses lurk in wounded hearts. Post-Rebellion.
1. Chapter 1

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OoOoO

Madoka ran through the streets of Mitakihara. Behind her, the staccato rhythm of marching boots. The distant roar of flames and pillars of smoke against the starry night sky told her the city was burning somewhere.

The streets ahead of her were overrun by purple tin soldiers and… and… cotton-swabs with fish tails, locked in battle. She ducked and weaved through the melee with a frantic grace. She couldn't move like that, could she? It was like standing aside and watching as her body rolled beneath stray weapon blows and slid between fighters all on its own. She ran through streets choked with the fallen without stumbling and once jumped over a raging melee by rebounding off the side of a building above the soldiers' heads. That couldn't possibly be her.

The tin soldiers kept to tight box formations, jagged spears set as they charged. Swarms of the cotton-swabs, armed with their own curved black spears, screamed shrill chittering war cries and threw themselves recklessly against the tin soldiers' formations en masse. Most of the formations held, but a few broke and scattered under the sheer press of bodies thrown against their front. Knee-high black polka-dotted mice ran panicked through the battle, a few unable to escape the shifting lines and getting trampled underfoot.

Above it all, Madoka heard the marching wave still charging behind her.

She couldn't turn around to see them, but she knew they were there. A wave of tin soldiers, an entire army of them, marching shoulder to shoulder in a dense formation that went from one side of Mitakihara's plaza-like street to the other. The soldiers did not shout or call out as they marched and trampled, but they cut down and silenced the skirmishes in the street as they advanced, cotton swabs and polka-dot mice and fellow tin soldier alike. They were hunting her. She mustn't be caught.

A whistling noise, and a spear thrown from the wave of soldiers behind her plunged down and impaled a cotton swab ahead of her. More whistling noises, one after another until they nearly drowned out the marching, and that first spear became a rain of spears. The skirmishes broke and scattered into chaos, survivors trying to flee. One spear pierced a polka-dot mouse an arm's-length away from her; it had an expressionless blue ring instead of a face, but its body shuddered and legs twitched.

She couldn't be caught. If she was caught, they would tear her to pieces.

She had no idea where she was going, but she couldn't keep running down the street until she was struck with a spear or bogged down and trampled. There weren't any intersections nearby she could reach, but she cast about until she spotted an alley set in the dense downtown sprawl. She sprinted, deft and fleet, dodging falling spears and cutting around fighters running every direction. The tin soldiers were relentless, but rigid; she could hide in the alley while they swept the streets. At the end of her frantic dash, she slid into the alley and stopped herself against a wall. The alley was a dead end. She sank into its shadows, letting them hide her from the lights of the main street.

The sounds of marching swelled. Seconds after she reached relative safety, the army of tin soldiers burst past the alley entrance. And then, in perfect synchronization, they slowed their charge as if they'd been given some wordless command, stopped, and turned to face her.

Madoka backed up as they set their spears and advanced on her. A wall blocked the alley end behind her; there was a fire escape running up the side of the building, but if she went for it they'd attack her from behind. She didn't have a choice, she had to try for the ladder before they got even closer.

She turned and ran for the ladder, and just as she did she got a look at what was coming _down_ the building.

Enormous, sinuous. It rushed past her, and Madoka threw herself to the ground. Teeth, razors that could shred her, red blotches on a black body. The giant snake-thing struck at the tin soldiers. They still gave no word or cry, but the sound of rending teeth and frenzied chewing was enough.

Madoka bit her lip to keep herself quiet and looked at the fire escape. The drop ladder wasn't lowered, so the bottom rung was almost a whole floor off the ground; somehow, she knew she could reach it anyway. The black flying snake-monster wasn't paying attention to her and its tail wasn't quite blocking the ladder. She slid around the monster, stood under the ladder, gathered her breath and bent her knees, and froze when the monster suddenly turned away from its feast to look at her.

Its face was almost clownish, or would have been if it hadn't been chewing on… chewing. Mad ringed eyes of blue, red, and yellow sat in a face as white as makeup and stared at her with open interest. Blue and red feelers or wings fluttered at the top of its head, and it sniffed at her with a red star nose. The silence was broken only by the sound of its chewing on leftovers and a distant explosion that sent a single tremor through the ground. The monster swallowed, and gave her a razor smile large than she was, framed with yellow-dotted cheeks.

Then it surged upwards between the buildings and out of sight, and Madoka let out the breath she'd been holding.

The tin soldiers anywhere near the alley had been shredded, but she could hear fresh ranks marching in. The monster's attack had given her time and room, but she had to move. She gathered herself and leapt for the drop ladder. It was twice her height off the ground, but her hand easily closed around the bottom rung and she scrambled up it easily. A few spears clattered off the metal around her as she all but flew up the escape stairs. She burst up to the rooftop, and finally got a clear view of the city.

Mitakihara burned. Streaks of fire like comets blazed through the sky, striking the towers with resounding explosions. Buildings crumbled into flame, and the outer edges of the city had simply been consumed in one vast inferno.

And at the opposite edge of the roof, a child stood facing away from Madoka. The devastation stretched out beneath her, but she looked up steadfastly into the sky. She was even shorter than Madoka and wore a black cap with cat ears over waist-length wavy hair, pure white but cast in orange from the reflection of flames.

The girl was familiar. The girl was a wounded monster, the girl was healed, the girl was known to her. Madoka found herself walking toward the child, arms out as if to hug her from behind.

If the child sensed her presence, she didn't give any sign. Instead of turning around, she raised one hand to shield her eyes against the sky and spoke with a hollow voice.

"A Curse binds us down and chokes us into silence."

Madoka was only steps away and reached out to grasp her, but before she could, the other girl's body lost coherence and burst into a thick, smoky mist so dark red it was almost black. Madoka gasped and stepped back; the mist writhed and boiled violently, then dissipated into nothingness.

A burst of orange light in the sky drew Madoka's eye. There was a blazing ball of light hanging in the air exactly in the direction the white-haired child had been staring, hanging while all the other lights streaked through the sky. Madoka watched as it steadily grew larger, until she could make out a vicious grin set on its front and the flaming skeleton of a dirigible behind. It was an aircraft, falling from the sky in a hellish blaze. Another second, and she realized with a start that it seemed still because was heading right for her.

She sprinted for the side of the roof, knowing she probably had no chance to get clear. The crackling roar and whoosh of flames filled the air ahead of its impact, and Madoka jumped from the side of the building—

—and gasped as somebody grabbed her mid-air, spinning her about and changing her direction. To the side, the dirigible slammed into the building and sent it crumbling with a thunderous roar, but Madoka and her rescuer were speeding away from the blast. They swung away on a spread of yellow ribbons stretching out into the city around them. From the fireman's carry, Madoka could look out over the city. More flaming dirigibles were plummeting like bombs and the fires were spreading unchecked, but now the city was flooding too.

Purple liquid sloshed and swelled in the streets. Where had the water all come from? The river that ran through the city's heart couldn't be enough for all this. The water rose, and Madoka could see soldiers and mice struggling and drowning. The fish-tailed cotton swabs flitted through the water like mermaids, freely spearing the soldiers and dragging them beneath the surface.

Madoka and her rescuer were swinging downward. With a splash, they landed on a hill that was giving way to the rising tide. Her rescuer set her down in ankle-deep purple liquid. Before Madoka could get a look at her face, she kept walking a few more paces up the hill, looking up to the sky. She was taller than Madoka and wore a feathered cap above golden blond curls that tumbles from either side of her head in enormous spirals. Her blouse, corset, skirt, and boots were in whites, yellows, and browns. One hand gripped a long musket, pointed at the ground.

This girl too was familiar. Protection and dedication, stretched across a yawning void. Madoka wanted to burrow into her side and use her as a shield. Instead, she tried to follow the other girl's sight. There was no leering dirigible falling toward them this time; there were other dirigibles, but they were all falling elsewhere.

Madoka kept staring, until she found a dark patch in the night sky. Starless and flameless, it seemed to swallow everything and trap it within. She squinted, trying to make anything out. She thought she saw…

...hanging in the sky, not because it was coming in their direction, but truly hanging unsupported and unmoving. She saw a stone. There was a stone graven with the image of a girl, arms out in mercy, and…

Madoka blinked, and lost sight of it.

The girl who had rescued Madoka finally spoke, her throaty voice heavy with loss and shaky with tears.

"A Curse drags our hope down from the heavens."

And she burst into red-black coils of mist that twined around Madoka. She shuddered at how oily and sick the mist felt against her skin, and then it dissipated just like before.

The purple liquid sloshed against her stockings halfway up her calves. It had been only up to her ankles when they landed. Madoka hugged herself and started hiking up the hill with the street, quickly leaving the liquid behind and heading the same direction she'd seen the stone hanging in the sky.

There were still tin soldiers and fish-tailed cotton swabs fighting in this part of the city, but only a few in small pockets. Giving the fights a wide berth was easy. The fighting had been fiercer earlier, though; the number of fallen monsters vastly outnumbered those still living, and Madoka had to jump over unmoving lump after unmoving lump.

Deep tremors shook the ground, Madoka's only warning before two behemoths burst into view from a sidestreet. They scraped across the sides of skyscrapers as they fought, large enough to stand above some of the towers. One was an enormous skeleton in a black dress, the other an armored leviathan with a fish's tail. The skeleton's hands were bound in stocks, which the leviathan grasped with one hand while flailing about with a sword in the other.

Madoka had only seconds to take this in, and then the two towering monsters crashed through the other side of the street and vanished again. They knocked loose a mass of debris that came falling toward the street below, and Madoka caught a glimpse of enormous white teeth and glittering scales before she jumped back to try to stay clear of the landing.

The teeth and scales never had a chance to hit her, though, because a wall of red chain netting burst into existence to catch them. Madoka turned around to find the girl who made the chains, a girl with a messy red ponytail all the way down to her waist and a flowing red outfit that tapered into a loose skirt. She had a spear slung over her shoulders, and one hand was stretched out to the chain net; when she lowered it, the chains vanished.

Like the others, she faced away from Madoka. Like the others, she was familiar. She walked through the valley of shadow and rekindled her light. She spoke, and her voice was quiet and sad.

"A Curse drives us apart from one another," she said, "And a Curse delivers us into evil's power."

Then she too was nothing but dark red mist. Madoka reached out as though to grab the tendrils and keep them with her. The feel of it made her flesh crawl as her hands grasped in vain. The mist dissipated, and Madoka choked back a sob as one more friend vanished.

And then Madoka stopped short as a fourth girl walked past her, heading up the hill.

A white cloak billowed behind her, and her blue hair whipped out in a breeze that Madoka couldn't feel. Madoka gasped, and knew this girl. She chased after her, trying to grab the other's cloak, a thousand questions stuck in her throat and her limbs heavy as though swimming in amber.

"A Curse mocks our struggles." Sayaka's voice, though low, trembled with barely-contained fury. She shuddered as she walked; her fists were clenched, one bare and the other holding a sword that rattled and sparked as its tip trailed against the street behind her. Madoka desperately tried to catch Sayaka to pull her into a hug that could still her trembling fury, but somehow she was always just out of reach. Sayaka spoke again, voice tight. "A Curse poisons our sincerity."

Sayaka came to a sudden stop and lifted her sword until it pointed ahead and above. With small, mincing steps, Madoka walked around to Sayaka's side and looked where Sayaka's blade pointed.

At the top of the hill not far ahead, two parallel wooden poles stretched into the sky, with something glinting orange in the light of flames between them. With a start, Madoka realized it was a blade suspended in the air by a rope; the entire thing was a guillotine.

"A Curse drowns us in hate."

Then Sayaka turned away from the guillotine in disgust, faced the slowly-rising flood of purple liquid, and stood with her blade at guard.

Madoka looked again at the guillotine, and realized there was a girl waiting at the base. She stood with her head bowed, elegant black dress and long raven-dark hair both flapping, and if she were to kneel then her neck would be beneath the blade.

Sayaka was still shuddering and twitching as though in pain or holding herself back. Madoka probably should have stayed with her, but she was also sure Sayaka was standing guard so that she could go up the hill. She wavered, looking between her best friend and this dark phantom, then took a deep breath and began up the hill.

The girl was crying. Her shoulders were shaking only minutely and she made no sound, but Madoka could tell she was crying. She shouldn't have to cry. She deserved better! That conviction burned in Madoka's heart with an intensity that surprised her, and her feet began to move faster.

"Curse me."

The other girl's voice rang out clear and beautiful over the hill and above the din of distant battle. Madoka's heart leapt into her throat when the girl spoke and her hands came up on impulse, whether to reach out or ward the dark girl away, Madoka didn't know.

"Curse me!"

The girl shouted this time. Madoka wanted to run away; she wanted to run forward and embrace the girl. They weren't in Mitakihara anymore. The city and the hill and the guillotine had somehow melted away when she wasn't watching. Now a dewy field of grass and flowers was beneath her bare feet. The sun was bright and clear as it climbed above them, trees in the distance swayed in a gentle breeze, and two handsome chairs made from solid white wood lay strewn on the ground on broken turf as though they'd been thrown down in a violent rage. The chairs were on either side of the girl, facing away from each other where they fell.

The girl was writhing, hands clutching at her face. Madoka herself trembled as she came to a stop only paces away. The twin urges to flee and to run toward the girl were overpowering; fear and want warred with each other, leaving Madoka standing paralyzed with indecision. But there was a name on the tip of her tongue; she knew this girl. It tore its way from her throat. " _Homura!_ "

Homura spun around and burst forward, hands arched and grasping.

"CURSE ME!"

She slammed into Madoka and tackled her to the ground. Her eyes were filled with red light and crimson lines trailed down her face like bloody spiderwebs. Madoka shrieked as Homura thrashed and grasped and tore at her. Madoka threw her arms in front of her face and sobbed and begged her to stop as Homura howled in mindless pain. Something tore, something ripped in half, and Madoka's strength gave out entirely. She couldn't struggle anymore, couldn't fight as Homura's hands clenched around her throat and squeezed. She was falling, she was fading into darkness.

* * *

OoOoO

 **A Curse Between Us**

 **Chapter 1**

OoOoO

* * *

Someone was knocking at her door. The voice of her father, Kaname Tomohisa, came through. "Madoka? Sweetie, are you up?"

Madoka jerked her eyes open, then squeezed them shut again when the sun decided to stab her in the face. Was this how Mama felt every morning? She pried her eyes open again and looked at her clock, and then she was very awake. "Oh no! I was supposed to meet Homura this morning!"

"Sweetie?"

"I'm up, Papa!" She suited her words by flinging her blankets away and jumping out of bed. She was awake now, but her body still disagreed, and pins and needles jabbed all up her sleepy legs as soon as they tried to hold her weight. Madoka stumbled but caught herself against her nightstand, wincing as her blood all-too-slowly crept back into circulation. "Sorry, Papa! I'm fine! I'll go get Mama up."

"I already woke her. Take your time if you need to, you still have a little bit. I'll have breakfast ready for you downstairs."

"Thank you! Something I can take with me, please!"

By the simple expedient of leaving her bed sheets in a tangle, not brushing her teeth, and dressing as fast as she could even though her legs still weren't quite cooperating, she managed to stumble down the stairs to the kitchen in a record time four minutes later, trying to tie her red ribbons blind. The ribbons Homura gave her.

Her mother, Kaname Junko, was already downing her last bit of coffee and looked far more composed and mature in her business suit and skirt than Madoka could possibly hope to manage this morning. Judging from the look Junko was giving her daughter, Madoka probably wasn't doing a very good job tying her pigtails up without a mirror either. She glanced at the clock, then smiled at Madoka. "I can make a few minutes more, I think. Let me help with that, your pigtails are lopsided."

"Thank you, Mama." As her mother moved behind her and started fiddling with her ribbons, Madoka couldn't help but keep glancing at the clock herself. Her father was standing over the stove, putting the finishing touches on what smelled like eggs. Her stomach grumbled at her. Only her little brother Tatsuya was cheerfully unaware of the morning rush, sitting in his high chair and happily knocking cheerios around his tray without a care for whether they got to his mouth or not.

Why couldn't she stay and play with him like that? She hated waking up late!

"I missed my usual wake-up call," her mother said as she worked. "Maybe I shouldn't complain, though? Tomo's much nicer about getting me up. He doesn't slam doors and yank curtains open, unlike my sweet and gentle daughter."

Even though she said it with good humor, Madoka still felt bad. "I'm sorry I didn't get you up, Mama. I haven't been sleeping well at all lately." Her eyes drifted back to the clock. She was going to be late, definitely for meeting Homura and probably for the start of class.

Her father looked over from the stove. "Is jet lag still bothering you, sweetie? We've only been back a few days."

"Maybe…."

"Well, let us know if it keeps up," her mother said. "We can pick something up from the pharmacy to help you switch to Japan time again if you need it." She finished the last touches on Madoka's ribbons and pigtails, then stepped back to get a better look. "There you are, adorable as always."

Madoka immediately poured herself a glass of juice and chugged it as fast as she could as soon as her mother was done. She was so distracted she missed the timing when her mother came over for their customary morning high-five goodbye; she hadn't even noticed her mother giving Tatsuya and Tomohisa their goodbye kisses right before. Junko took pity on her flustered, off-kilter daughter and patted her cheeks before leaving for work, saying, "Keep your head up, sweetie. Alright, now I'm off!"

Madoka grabbed her bag and started for the door, but her father stopped her. "You already had something to drink? Good. Lunch is in your bag already, and here's something for the road." He passed her a fried egg and toast sandwich bagged for transport. "We can talk about the pharmacy when you get home if you want to. Have a good day, sweetie!"

"Thank you, Papa! Bye, Tatsuya!" And then Madoka took off out the door, without waiting to give her father a hug or see if her brother looked up from his cheerios to wave at her. Her stomach was still grumbling at her, but she took off running anyway. She didn't think she should slow down enough to try eating until she'd made up for lost time. Then, as she got out to the main road and hit the first intersection, she saw the tin soldier standing at the corner.

It—or she?—wore a nutcracker uniform of white and light purples, with darker accents on the legs, arms, and tall hat. Red-rimmed glasses clung somehow to its smooth, featureless purple face framed in braids that were almost familiar. It stood rigid and motionless, locked in guard, though guarding what or why Madoka couldn't say, and its jagged spear pointed straight up into the sky at attention. A child in a black dress with a hood with an orange bobble on its head jumped around and danced at the soldier's feet, trying to get any reaction out of the stoic soldier.

Mitakihara burning. A tide of spears and charging tin soldiers, charging forward to trample without mercy. A razor grin, and two heads turned away from her, both with hair whipping in the wind, one short and blue, one long and black….

It was just a silly dream, of course. Being back in Mitakihara was strange, but the city was fine. She didn't know anything about polka-dot mice or cotton swabs with fish tails, but all the tin soldiers she'd seen in Mitakihara only stood guard.

She almost ran forward to pull the child away from the soldier anyway, the anxiety from her dream was that strong. But surely that was silly. They only stood guard. The child wasn't in any danger.

But to make herself feel a little better, even though she was in such a hurry, Madoka took the time to cross to the other side of the street before passing the tin soldier.

OoOoO

On the way to school, Madoka couldn't help but gawk a little. No, not quite gawk. Gawking would be understandable. Mitakihara had been built to be a clean and sharp city of the future, skyscrapers gleaming in the morning light and floating holograms used trivially in everything from billboards to crosswalk buttons. She'd lived in a big city in America, but big wasn't the issue. Mitakihara was also new, recently built and every aspect of it brimming with the need to show off.

But Madoka wasn't gawking like some tourist or newly returned citizen. She was watching the corners and over her shoulder. No matter how clean and pretty Mitakihara tried to be, she couldn't rid herself of the feeling of being watched or followed or out of place or… or… something. Which was silly, because the only people following her were other late-rising Mitakihara students who were also rushing to school.

She thought she recognized the child that had been taunting the tin soldier once when she looked over her shoulder, but there wasn't anything odd about spotting someone twice in a day. Or maybe she just wasn't used to all the crows that seemed to love perching in the trees along the path to school? They hopped about and squabbled noisily, eyes intent and a splotch of white on their face. She could swear that some of them were staring at her as she jogged by.

It certainly didn't help that thanks to her late wakeup she felt sweaty and grungy and her teeth needed brushing and she was almost certainly going to have to use the washroom at the first break, or before class if she had enough time. She slowed down to eat her fried egg sandwich once she'd made some headway, which at least helped with her grumbling stomach. When she was done, she couldn't quite make herself start running again.

She didn't want to be late and she'd promised to meet Homura on the way to school, but somehow the reluctance wouldn't go away. It probably didn't matter. She'd made up a lot of time running, enough that she'd caught up with more than just the other last-minute stragglers. She could slow down, probably.

Homura had been in her dream. The details were already fuzzy even though they'd been vivid and cutting when she first woke. Her pace grew slower as she tried to remember anything she could.

"Hey, you!"

Homura had been sad. No, not just sad, in pain. Because… she wasn't sure why. Was it because there was a war in the city? Did Homura even care about that? Of course she would, everyone would care about a war in their city, wouldn't they? But was that why Homura'd been so upset? She'd been wearing a beautiful dress, but it was dreary like something worn to a funeral. Had someone died?

"Hey, transfer studeeeeent!"

Madoka squeaked as someone ran into her at full bore, sending both of them staggering. Instinctive footwork kept her from falling down, but so did the arms that clamped around her from behind. Madoka shrieked and twisted in place to try to shove her attacker off.

"I found you, Madoka! I found you at last!" her attacker said, giggling.

…giggling?

She opened her eyes, and found she recognized her "attacker." Earnest blue eyes glittering with mischief, loose chin-length hair scattered just a bit tomboyishly, wearing the same Mitakihara girls' uniform, and leaning in eagerly; Madoka sagged with relief into what was actually a hug. "Sayaka?"

Sayaka, still holding on, turned up the full energy of her smile. "What's with this, Madoka? I heard from my mom you were coming back to Japan and I saw you in class yesterday, so why haven't you come over to see me yet?"

Madoka's sudden pleasure wilted a little. "W-well, honestly, I thought you wouldn't really remember me? It's been a long time..."

"What? That's stupid! I'd never forget My Dokes!" Sayaka swatted her shoulder. "We've been friends since we were babies and you think I'd forget you from just three years apart? The only reason I didn't jump you yesterday was because Akemi absconded with you in the middle of class before I even got a chance! 'I thought you wouldn't remember me.' Honestly, that hurts!"

Madoka giggled. "I'm sorry, Sayaka."

"Well, if you're sorry, then I have no choice but to forgive you." Sayaka broke the hug and then started walking, grabbing Madoka's hand and tugging her along. Madoka felt a wave of warm nostalgia as they walked; it was just like when they were little kids, holding hands and skipping along their way to elementary school to meet up with Hitomi and Kyousuke. Sayaka started talking again, saying, "So tell me about America, then! You lived in Seattle, didn't you? What was that like?"

Madoka nodded. "It wasn't that different from Mitakihara, at least where I lived. I guess it was louder? And rainier. And there were a few bad parts of town Mama told me not to go in. It's not as new as Mitakihara, so it can be run down in places. And… I never really felt like I fit in at school, even after my English got better."

"You must be happy to be back in Japan then, right?"

Madoka looked away. "I… don't know."

Sayaka looked at her, noticing Madoka's fallen spirit immediately. "Oh?"

Madoka had been trying to stay cheerful for her family. Mama and Papa and even Tatsuya had all been so happy to be back in Japan, not that Tatsuya knew what the change of scenery meant. But one look at Sayaka's worried face, and Madoka knew she wouldn't be able to pretend in front of her oldest friend. She didn't even want to, and it all started tumbling out. "I mean, I've only been back a few days really, so maybe I'm just getting used to it again, but everything feels off. Maybe I'll feel better when my sleep adjusts?" She heaved a sigh. "I've been having nightmares too, but I didn't want to tell Mama and Papa about that. They knew I didn't like living away and they were really hoping I'd feel better once we came back to Mitakihara, but now I feel even worse. All I know is the city feels creepy and wrong somehow, and I'm not supposed to be here, and I don't even know what's wrong that's making me feel like this."

Sayaka pumped her free hand in the air. "Good thing I'm here, then! If anyone tries to give you any trouble, I'll smack 'em around and show the bastards how to welcome a returning citizen home properly!"

"Thank you, Sayaka!" Madoka giggled and gave Sayaka a sidelong look, "But you know, you shouldn't swear like that!"

"Heh heh, sorry! I guess I don't get a free pass now that you're back to keep me in line." Then Sayaka realized something, and a wicked grin split over her lips. "Oh, Madoka, but you're going to absolutely _crazy_ when you meet Kyouko."

"Who?"

"You'll see! She's in our class." Sayaka was almost giddy at the idea. "Hey, I asked why you didn't come over already, didn't I? Yeah? So you should come over already, right? How about today?"

"You haven't changed a bit, Sayaka."

Madoka said it fondly, but when she did a shadow seemed to pass over Sayaka. It was fast, so fast that Madoka only caught it because she was still drinking in the sight of her oldest friend's face. Then it was gone, and Sayaka's smile was back but not quite as strong as it was before. "You'd be surprised," she said.

Despite the strange moment, Madoka still giggled at that. "I'm not sure I believe you! But, anytime after school's great for me."

Sayaka looked away, thinking. "Um... maybe a few hours after? I have some homework and other things I gotta blitz through first."

And Madoka stopped mid-step, stopping Sayaka with her. "Eh?"

"What?"

"You're doing homework first?"

Sayaka blinked a few times. "Yeah, I try to get it out of the way. What's wrong with that?"

"Nothing! Nothing at all! But you always used to put homework off as long as you could."

Sayaka gave her a flat glare and rolled her eyes. "See? I have changed! So we just get to know each other again, that's all." Her irrepressible smile popped back onto her face and she let go of Madoka's hand to pull her cellphone out of her bag. "Phone check!"

Madoka pulled out her own phone, pulled up her number, and held it up for Sayaka to see. Sayaka fiddled with hers, then sent Madoka a text. "...there," she said. "Now you've got my number and my house address if you don't remember the way. Mom's already got your new address, so don't worry about that."

Then, putting her phone away, Madoka got a glimpse of the time on its screen and gasped. "Oh no! I have to hurry, I told Homura I'd meet her before school. Um, do you want to come too?"

Sayaka's smile dimmed again. "Maybe another day?" she said. "I kinda ran ahead of Kyouko when I saw you. I should wait for her to catch up."

"Oh. Okay."

They looked at each other for a moment, Madoka fiddling with her bag straps and Sayaka bouncing her weight between her feet, neither wanting to be the first to leave but not knowing what else to say. When the pause had lasted long enough that they heard the first bell in the distance calling them to class, Sayaka, eyes shining, reached up with her free hand to squeeze Madoka's shoulder and said, "I'm so glad you're here, Madoka. There's not much point in it without you."

Madoka couldn't help it; she could feel herself tearing up. "Sayaka?"

Sayaka cocked her head, smile still warm and strong. "Yeah?"

"I... just wanted to say your name."

Sayaka giggled, warm and true, chasing the shadow off her face. "Well then! Madoka! Ma-do-ka! My Dokes!"

Madoka was halfway between laughing and crying, so she settled for jumping toward her friend for a hug. Sayaka caught her and wrapped her up in strong arms, letting Madoka hide in her taller frame. Everything felt wrong and out of place, nightmares with some message she couldn't grasp plagued her sleep, instincts she didn't understand told her she was vulnerable and hunted, the city itself felt wrong and broken, but Sayaka—Sayaka was still her friend, Sayaka would never forget her. In the middle of everything wrong, Sayaka was _right_.

Even so, she couldn't let herself stay here and go to pieces. It would be nice to just stay home and cry and laugh with her best friend, but she needed to live. Right now, that meant going to meet Homura before school, and the thought of that more than anything else told her she needed to get back to the fight. She pulled back from Sayaka after a moment, covering her face with her hands, and laughed. "I'm a complete mess, aren't I? Don't look at me right now!"

Sayaka tugged a handkerchief out of her pockets and pressed it into Madoka's hand. "Here."

"Sorry about this," Madoka said as she set about cleaning herself up.

"You're my first friend," Sayaka said, shrugging like that was all there was to say on the matter. "You've got to go meet Homura now, right?"

Madoka gave her a tremulous smile on the verge of breaking out into another round of tears. "Thank you, Sayaka."

Her friend flapped her hands in Madoka's direction, laughing. "Ah, you're embarrassing me! Now get! Get!"

Madoka gave her one last look, happy and grateful, before turning and running down the path. Sayaka stood with a content smile on her face, watching as Madoka weaved in and out of the thickening crowd, growing distant. Eventually Madoka slowed to a walking pace again as she caught up with someone and waved in greeting.

Sayaka couldn't make out much of the other girl at this distance other than long black hair and a liquid gait; she was lucky the crowd left her enough of a window to see them Madoka and Homura at all. One detail was obvious, though. The sunlight caught on the purple gem hanging from her earring, reflecting a piercing gleam.

 _'I should thank you, Miki Sayaka. Madoka's in quite a better mood now thanks to you.'_

Sayaka's mouth twisted into a grimace as she replied to the telepathy. _'I don't want Madoka unhappy, Akemi.'_

Homura's reply was wordless and soundless. Sayaka felt a distinct wave of approval flow down the telepathic connection, as though nothing could please Homura more than to hear that sentiment. Approval, tinged throughout with her bubbling amusement at the sight of Sayaka doing her work for her. Sayaka scoffed as the telepathy connection cut and the sense of Homura's mind faded.

The crunch of Kyouko biting into an apple roused her. Kyouko came up the path at a sedate pace, school bag dangling carelessly from a loose grip. Clamping down on the apple to hold it in her mouth for a moment, she grabbed a second apple with her free hand and tossed it to Sayaka. "So, any particular reason you wanted me to hang back just now, Blue?"

"Didn't want to crowd her much just yet." Sayaka nodded her thanks and bit into her apple. "She's feeling kinda jumpy, after all."

Kyouko cocked her head to the side, sending her ponytail swinging. "Alright, I'll bite. 'She' who?"

"Old friend of mine. Transfer student from yesterday. You'll meet her later, she's coming over."

"What, you up to something?"

Sayaka flashed Kyouko a grim, tight smile. "Tell you later."

"Alright, whatever, if it's not important then."

Sayaka let the smile disappear, turned her back, and started walking toward the school again. "It's important," she said over her shoulder.

"Well la-dee-da." Kyouko flipped the apple core over a knot of students and into a trashcan. "Aren't we fucking dramatic today?"

That got an amused snort out of Sayaka, however worried she was. "Heh. A bit, yeah."

OoOoO

The miasma over Mitakihara was thick. The faux-city within the mists was silent; no chattering crowds, no honking traffic, no life, only the claustrophobic mists pressing in. The afternoon sun, choked out by the wraiths' power, barely lit the world in a dull lifeless gray. It was barely better than fighting at night. Of course, the sun was supposed to burn away the miasma during the day, leaving night the only time the wraiths were able to coalesce from the darkness and fear in human hearts and come forth to wreak havoc.

Sayaka felt someone should tell the wraiths this.

 _'_ _Nother one on your eight o'clock, newbie!'_

Sayaka snarled and put on another burst of speed as she skipped over the rooftops, trying to keep the new wraith on her left from getting a good position. The others ahead and behind her circled, constantly moving. Enormous pale men four times as tall as her with strange faces as though bits of them were breaking off into pixelation, their long robes whipped and fluttered as the wraiths flew about her. Hands outstretched, luminescent energy beams like golden burning light shot from their fingers whenever they thought they had her pinned. She hated the flying ones. Extra mobility just made them even more of a pain than usual.

She rushed the front, and the wraiths there fell back and melted away while the ones at her back and sides swooped in. Turn to face the ones at her back, and the ones now behind her dove for the kill. Sayaka survived only by staying in constant motion and jumping from roof to roof and building to building as a rain of golden light from the wraiths struck every position heartbeats after she left it. The circle of wraiths was still wide, constantly forced back by her reckless bulrushes, and leaving her a wide choice of landing points for every jump. This was probably the only reason the wraiths hadn't pinned her with fire yet.

A crimson spear flew within arms' reach of her. Sayaka traced its path, and found a wraith she'd missed frantically backpedaling through the air. Kyouko's voice spoke in her mind. ' _Oi newbie, didn't I tell you to watch your goddamn back?'_

Sayaka flung her sword, sending it spinning like a rogue buzzsaw across the city and right through another swarm of wraiths across the street, scattering them briefly. Kyouko was in the middle of that swarm somewhere, a flash of vivid crimson in all the fluttering deathly white. _Who are you calling newbie? You're the one who let them separate us, Kyouko!_

 _'_ _Cuz I can take 'em myself, Blue! Shut up and fight your share of toga freaks!_

Sayaka snarled at the wraiths flying around her. Bravado aside, she and Kyouko needed to fight together. They both knew it. Sayaka dodged over a burst of golden light, manifested a new sword in her grasp, rebounded off the side of a radio tower with a leap, and hung in the air for a split second as a platform formed of blue music staffs formed at her feet. She was ready to launch herself in Kyouko's direction, but the wraiths shifted to block her path. She could charge anyway and force the issue, but she would leave herself open to attack as she tried to rush past them. With a curse, she let the magic platform fade away and fell back to perch on top of the radio tower. ' _I can't get to you now.'_

 _'Tch. Goddamn monsters.'_

Sayaka didn't disagree with that, but they also weren't _stupid_ monsters. They'd seen Kyouko and Sayaka together, and weren't letting that happen again. She had seven or eight wraiths circling her, waiting for an opening, always keeping the bulk of their forces between her and her friend.

Well, fine then. Let them block Kyouko off all they want. ' _Hey Kyouko, send another spear my way! I wanna do a thing!'_

Kyouko didn't reply, but she flung three more spears with a shout that echoed in the still mists. The spears spread out, the flare of red magic flickering at their tips as they sped toward Sayaka's swarm of wraiths. Of course, over this distance it was easy for the wraiths to spot and dodge the spears before they became a threat, doing nothing but clearing a momentary gap in the swarm.

But that was all Sayaka needed.

She kicked off the radio tower and called out the blue music platform again. The wraiths brought golden light to their hands and prepared to intercept her as they flew back into the gap, and then she launched herself in completely the wrong direction. Instead of rushing the wraiths between her and Kyouko, she followed the path of the spears as they opened a hole on the far side of the swarm. Caught off-guard as their prey escaped in the wrong direction, all the wraiths could do was send bursts of golden light trailing after her.

 _'_ _Back in a minute! Don't die while I'm gone!'_

 _'_ _Yeah, just hope I leave some leftovers for you, Blue!'_

She was faster than they were, at a sprint or over distance, Sayaka was sure of it. They'd only managed to hedge her in because she hadn't gotten sustained speed, but now she kicked from musical platform to musical platform, not even bothering to come back down to the rooftops as she launched herself over and over. Bursts of golden light arced past her, only barely faster than her and doing little more than illuminating the mists around her. She could feel the wraiths chasing her, twisted knots of rage in her magical senses, but they were rapidly falling behind.

And then she came to the edge of the miasma. Tendrils of dark mists pulled at her, trying to keep her from escaping the wraiths' domain. For one second, she hung midair at the border between the miasma and the wholesome day, sudden sunlight hitting her eyes and warming her skin. Another platform, and she reversed her direction and launched herself back into the battle, back toward the wraiths.

The wraiths had followed her, but they were spread out and their formation was broken from the chase. She dropped from the sky and into Mitakihara's streets, first onto a broad boulevard and then rocketing into side streets, still not giving up any speed. Then she was beneath the swarm, dodging their bursts of light as they fired at her from above. By now the wraiths were so spread out that there was never more than one at a time positioned to fire into her street.

She was almost through the swarm. She cut back into the wider streets again, ready to make one final dash before passing the wraiths and heading back to the rooftops. Ahead of her, a wraith dropped from the sky and into the streets to cut her off.

"So you'll fight one on one after all," Sayaka muttered. Her grin was savage. "Too bad for you."

She let her sword dissipate into magic, then reforged it as an enormous straight-edged greatsword as tall as she was. Golden light flared in the wraith's hands, and Sayaka launched herself off one last platform for a final burst of speed. Blue magic flared into the crashing of cymbals and the screech of strings as she caught the golden blast on her sword. She spun, the light veered away off her blade, and she was inside the thing's guard.

It bellowed, a sound so deep the air vibrated. The pixelation that distorted its face left little room for expression, but the bite of its unknowing and unrelenting hatred filled Sayaka's senses with poison.

Her momentum carried her, and her spinning greatsword bit into the wraith and cut it apart from shoulder to hip in a single blow. Its corpse dissolved around her in a burst of squares and sickly pale light.

She leapt up to the rooftops again, letting her greatsword fade back into her normal blade. The swarm of wraiths that harried her was behind her and at the edge of the miasma, out of the way for the moment.

 _'Kyouko, where are you? Get to rooftops if you aren't already.'_

 _'At the—shit, fuck you scumbags!—Weltstadt mall. If you're gonna do something, hurry!'_

Sayaka changed course and sprinted through the rooftops. Weltstadthaus mall was a long bulging bubble of glass and metal shaped almost like a whale swimming through downtown Mitakihara. As she got closer, she could see five wraiths flying around it blasting a steady barrage of energy beams, strafing a figure in crimson atop the building. Kyouko spun through the storm, footwork guiding her around blasts that splashed against the glass windows, spear spinning and deflecting what she couldn't dodge. She was hitting all the right steps like it was a DDR machine cranked up to the highest difficulty, but she also wasn't getting any room to counterattack.

Sayaka hit the rear of the swarm before they even knew she was there, crashing into the back of a wraith and shoving her sword up to the hilt through its center of mass. The thing bellowed and died in a burst of light. Sayaka kept going, hit the rooftop running, slid inside Kyouko's dance, and started deflecting blasts with a sword in either hand.

"Hey Blue, what happened to your friends?" They spun around each other, weapons flashing, but with the nearby wraiths down to four and the two of them back to back, the stream of fire couldn't force them to move unless they let it.

"Ditched 'em aways back. Pretty sure they'll catch up in a minute."

"Better kill these scumbags quick then." Kyouko glared at the wraiths, watching their motions. "The two on our north keep flying past each other. Lillian thing."

Sayaka nodded. They held their ground, still deflecting blasts, until the two wraiths were near each other again. Kyouko burst from position and sprinted toward them, spraying red-linked chains above her. Sayaka leapt into the air and flung swords through the chains, hooking them into a heavy net. It crashed into the wraiths, Kyouko's chains grasping and constricting, and pulled them down. They hit the rooftop, the crash of shattering glass beneath them filling the air.

Sayaka and Kyouko were already sprinting in new directions, each heading for one of the two wraiths still free and flying. Kyouko skipped around the blasts coming her way, shouting a stream of insults. Sayaka just clenched her jaw and set two blades to block and barreled right through them. Trying to rush a position while completely surrounded by wraiths was suicide, but one on one the wraiths could only scatter useless light at the puella magi bearing down on them.

Sayaka and Kyouko struck. One wraith fell in two pieces, cut through at the middle. The other crashed to the ground with three spears buried in its stomach, heart, and throat. A moment later Kyouko and Sayaka fell upon the two bound wraiths struggling to get free. The monsters' enormous towering stature and pure radiating hatred counted for nothing while they were helpless, and they each died to a single cut to the head.

"And that is what you get, motherfucker, for thinking you could go all wolfpack on me!" Kyouko threw a single red link of chain at a wraith. The link went right through the giant corpse as it dissolved into pale light and pixels, instead hitting the rooftop and sending spiderweb cracks through the glass windows. "Tell all your toga friends next you see 'em, Sakura Kyouko's gonna wreck their shit!"

Sayaka nodded toward the air, where the rest of the wraiths she outran were nearly caught up. "Guess who's back?"

Kyouko looked up. The wraiths were in a tight clump of crisscrossing flight paths, hanging back now that their enemies were united again. "I see seven. You had seven on you earlier?"

"Eight. I got one alone."

"And we got three before they split us up. How come they only threw five at me and you got eight? That doesn't seem fair. Should I feel insulted?"

Sayaka rolled her eyes. "I guess they just love me. If you want them, go ahead!"

Kyouko spun her spear in front of her and set it ready for attack. "So, you wanna go charging the rest like a screaming berserker, or stand here looking all stoic and badass and cut 'em down as they come?"

Sayaka grinned and crossed her two blades. "Hmm. Stoic badass sounds pretty cool, but standing around letting them come at us however they want got us into this mess in the first place."

"Charging berserker it is. You watch my back, Sayaka."

"Only if you watch mine, Kyouko."

The two puella magi sprinted into a charge, side by side, weapons ready as they ran deeper into the dark mists. Kyouko let out a whoop. "Toga scumbags don't stand a chance!"

OoOoO

After, the miasma thinned and vanished, and Kyouko and Sayaka shifted back into the busy world of the living. They sat on top of the radio tower looking out over the city, back in their street clothes and legs dangling over the edge. A small hoard of grief cubes sat between them, pulling away clouds of dark corruption as they pushed the cubes to their soul gems. "Damn me," Kyouko said, stretching. "How many even was that? Like, sixteen in one go? In the middle of the fucking day, even. Been awhile since I saw that many wraiths at once."

"The miasma's getting thicker." Once her grief cubes were full, Sayaka chucked the used ones out into the air as hard as she could. They disappeared into the city below.

"Thicker? Meh, Mitakihara's always been a hellhole. Yeah, it's all shiny and shit up top, but it's got the Great Curse right in the middle, and there's always miserable people to curse the world and their fellow men, you know?"

"It's still getting worse. More of them, and they're working together better."

Kyouko shrugged. "I said I haven't seen this many in awhile, not I haven't seen this many at all before. Before your time, newbie. Wraiths come in waves a lot of the time."

Sayaka sent Kyouko a flat stare. "Didn't I tell you to stop calling me newbie? I've been at this for months already. And aren't you even a little curious why wraith numbers are spiking so hard?"

"Pfft, yeah, you know what? I asked Kyubey about some of that shit, like what determines wraith concentration." Kyouko shook her head and started building a little tower out of her used grief cubes. "So many numbers. He's got this thing down to a science, Blue. Like, did you know there's a spike in wraiths every Christmas? Everybody's running around stressing and freaking out about the holiday and parties and lousy weather and expensive presents they can't afford but got to buy anyway or they think their friends'll hate 'em for being cheap. All that extra anger and stress that people can't do anything with, it just floats around until more wraiths start popping up. Freaking moneychangers. Stupid things like that. Leave the arcanodemographics of blasphemy to bunnycat, we just gotta kill the togas where they pop up. And you're newbie until we get another newbie, newbie."

"Alright, wraiths come and go. But you ever get this many in the middle of day? You ever get _any_ in the middle of the day?"

"So it's getting real bad right now. Mitakihara, hellhole, like I said. What do you expect to do about it? We just kill wraiths, we can't do anything about people being shitty."

"We can't counter the enemy if we don't even ask why our they're changing their patterns."

"For God's _sake_ , Sayaka!" Kyouko threw her arms up. "It's fucking _whack-a-mole_. Wraiths don't plan, don't strategize, don't think. They just rampage and try to eat people. All we got a do is smack 'em down where they pop up."

Sayaka didn't respond or look at Kyouko. She just clenched her jaw and scowled, staring out over the city, sunlight glittering deceptively off the steel and glass and chrome.

The sudden grim silence dampened Kyouko's own mood. She set aside the grief cubes she was adding to the top of her tower and looked over at her friend. "Hey. Sayaka. Do you see something in all this I don't?"

Sayaka flung a few more cubes one by one out over the city and watched them disappear before answering. "It's not just my puella magi senses picking up wraiths all the time, and it's not just combat instincts either. Even just sitting at school or listening to music at the mall, it's like I'm always almost catching something at the edge of my sight. If it didn't match up so nicely with the surge in wraiths, I'd almost say I'm just going crazy, but…." Sayaka huffed, impatient and frustrated. "There's something wrong in this city. You really don't feel anything?"

"I'll… keep my guard up," Kyouko said, uncertainty obvious in her voice.

Sayaka replied with just a wordless sound of assent, then threw another cube.

"Why chuck cubes away like that, anyway?" Kyouko asked after a moment of silence. "That's got to make collecting them a pain in the ass for Kyubey."

"He can find them without my help," Sayaka muttered. "It's not like they hatch into new wraiths if you leave them alone. I'm just here to protect the city, not make things convenient for him."

"Fine, whatever. I haven't seen him around much lately anyhow." Kyouko sighed, knocked over her tower of eldritch building blocks, and started shoving the used grief cubes into one pocket and the unused spares into another. "Look, I'm not saying you're wrong about the wraiths or going crazy or anything, but you've been all kinds of keyed up and grim as hell lately. It couldn't hurt to rest up a bit, do some normal stuff, and have fun for once. Live it up while you can, you know?"

Sayaka nodded, threw the rest of her used cubes away in one handful, and pocketed her half of the spares. "Good thing I've got an old friend coming over today then, right?" She jumped to her feet. "Let's head home, I have homework I have to finish before Madoka comes over."

"Ugggh. Homework. I said _fun_ , Sayaka."

"And if I've got homework waiting, that means you do too," Sayaka said with a quirked smile, then leapt into the air.

Kyouko smacked her palm into her face. "Is this my reward for looking after your ass? God _damn_ it."

OoOoO

Madoka hummed as she walked along with a bounce in her step, carrying a lidded glass dish in both hands. She felt better about everything after meeting Sayaka this morning on the way to school. Just knowing that there was someone nearby who cared about her… Well, somehow the city wasn't as alien anymore. She wanted to walk the busy Mitakihara streets, see students getting out of their afterschool clubs now that it was late afternoon, see people shopping and buses rumbling. She wanted to know if the city felt right again.

That was why she out here walking to Sayaka's house instead of taking transit or getting Papa to drive her. He'd offered, of course, but she told him he'd already done more than enough by baking the cake she was carrying. Strawberry, with a filling Papa made by hand and stored canned and fresh fruit on top. It wasn't very ornate, since she sprung the request on him so late, but strawberry cake was one of Papa's best desserts. Sayaka would love it.

Madoka passed a broad tiled plaza, and stopped to rest at a bench and watch. Lines of pink and purple flowerbeds cut along the edges of the clearing. A radio station's event booth drew a cheering crowd at the far end from Madoka, shouting out prizes and slogans before going back to blaring bouncy J-pop. A small troop of tin soldiers had another corner of the plaza to themselves, practicing parade formations. Closer to Madoka, a raised fountain in the very center spurted gurgling water in rotating arcs. A flock of white-splotched crows played at jumping in and out of the water, shaking their wings to scatter rainbow droplets in the air.

See, just happy people. Madoka stood up, a little reassured, and began her journey again—but stopped, and squinted.

There was something just a bit wrong with the light above the plaza. It was darker, like a haze was eating the sunlight. Madoka rubbed her eyes and squinted, hoping it was a trick of the eye, but the haze didn't go away. Instead, it got thicker. Despite the warm day, Madoka felt a chill creeping over her.

OoOoO

 _'So what's so special about this Madoka chick that I gotta make a special run for snacks, anyway?'_ Kyouko asked by telepathy. She should be almost to the convenience store by now.

Sayaka fiddled about arranging food and a stack of plates on the low table she'd dragged into her room. _' We've got juice for drinks and some cookies for sugar, but we don't have anything solid in case she's actually hungry. Make sure you get a good pick of rice balls. Do you think ice in juice is overkill?'_

 _'Duh it is, don't water that down. And see, that's a nice reminder what I'm picking up, but it doesn't answer my question.'_

 _'Grab some pocky too if you want.'_

 _'Was gonna anyway. Hey, maybe I'll lift a box or two for shits and giggles. I'm losing my edge living with you like a tame little doggy.'_

 _'Kyouko!'_

 _'Sayaka!'_

 _'You have plenty of money! I even gave you some of my allowance to cover this! You don't need to steal to eat anymore!'_

 _'I'm teasing, dork. Now answer my damn question. Why am I running errands for this Madoka chick?'_

Sayaka huffed. She was pretty sure Kyouko would feel her annoyance at her seeping through their mental link. _'Because Madoka was my very first friend, and you enjoy doing me favors?'_

 _'Cute. Adorable, even. Don't you forget what happens when puella magi and muggles get tangled up with each other, Blue. Ugly as hell. You do remember how things went with violinboy, right?''_

 _'Shut up, Kyouko.'_

 _'I will fucking not. You remember how bad that fucked you over? Sure, protect the muggles all you want, but you've got no place in their world anymore. Forget them and just stick with me.'_

 _'No seriously, shut up!'_

This time Kyouko noticed that Sayaka wasn't angry, she was taut, and promptly shut up. Sayaka strained her senses. For just a minute there, she thought she'd felt… There. A patch of poison seeping into the world, to the… north. North and a little west. _'You feel that?'_

 _'Oh come on! What the hell is this, Blue? Another one? Two banks of miasma in one day? In the middle of the goddamn afternoon?'_

 _'It's bullshit,'_ Sayaka agreed.

 _'At least you spotted it while it's still small and weak. It's not gonna nom on anyone or move around for a day at least. We can get it later after your playdate.'_

 _'Better to get it before it even has a chance to get out of hand.'_

 _'Fine, whatever, if you really want to. But weren't you the one all jumped up about having your new girlfriend over? The only way that thing's waking up today is if we dangle the tastiest magic snack in all Japan right in front of it.'_

Sayaka didn't like it. Catching a miasma bank this new and weak was lucky, and every instinct she had was telling her to run out and kill it before it even had a chance to become a problem. But Madoka would be here any minute, and if anything could justify ignoring harmless miasma for a few hours, it was sitting Madoka down and having a long talk with her before Akemi managed the same. Maybe Akemi already had; she'd dragged Madoka off to who-knows-where for who-knows-what again during lunch today. Kyouko was right about them having time to spare, too. Even with Mitakihara's freakish rate of pumping out miasma, they should have a day before it became a threat.

 _'I'll go clear it out right after Madoka leaves,'_ Sayaka decided. _'How's shopping coming?'_

 _'You'll be proud to know I'm paying for my pocky. In return for good behavior, one or two of these rice balls are gonna mysteriously vanish before they reach our place.'_

OoOoO

The haze thickened. The soldiers marched on in place, the crowd around the radio booth kept clapping and cheering. Why was no one reacting to it? "Hello," Madoka tried to call out, her voice weak and thin. "Hello! Does anyone else see that?"

It _saw_ her. She shouldn't have called out! Somehow, someway, the haze knew she was there. It roiled, thirstily gulping away the sunlight, rapidly becoming more solid and viscous than a mere shimmering haze. Madoka stumbled backward, then shrieked as the haze suddenly dropped from the sky and pulled thick around her.

Cold. So cold, like the warmth was being drunk from her body. Something hungry was shrieking in her head, she couldn't think. Her limbs were dead from cold anyway.

She forced her eyes open, and found the whole world had gone dim. The only light was the dull bronze glimmer of the sun choked by masses of clouds and mist that hadn't been there a second ago. Three writhing masses of off-white _something_ rippled and seethed in the air before her. The crowd of people and the radio booth had vanished as though they had never existed. The crows were gone. The tin soldiers—were charging right at her, formation broken as they sprinted full bore with spears set.

The bone-deep cold held her shivering and paralyzed as the soldiers cut the distance down. She couldn't move. Her dream. Her dream of Mitakihara burning, waves of marching soldiers coming to trample her.

The three floating, seething masses ballooned outward, and became dirty white robes—became bodies—arms crossed over their chests. Three white robed men emerged from the tears in the world, the cold in her bones deepening as they swelled and grew. They were kneeling as they came into being, droning out a chant so deep it became part of the world and rattled the screams in her head to new heights. Still kneeling, they were larger than she was. Still kneeling, they raised their heads. Madoka heard the distant crash of glass as the cake dish slipped from her hands. They had no faces, and pieces torn from their heads floated about them in squares of cut flesh.

The tin soldiers struck. They charged the robed giants en masse, spears flashing, their tiny bodies crashing in droves against their larger foes. One giant screamed in death as half a dozen spears pierced its head. The other two surged to their feet, arms outstretched.

And the instant the giant's attention swung from Madoka to the soldiers, the cold inside her vanished. She spun around and burst into motion, running for her life. Bursts of golden light illuminated the world; the sound of tin soldiers hitting the ground without a cry chased her.

She fled, down the street as fast as her legs could carry her and harder. She ran every bit as fast as she had in that impossible dream where she bounded up buildings and dodged through battle. More tin soldiers ran down the street in the opposite direction, toward the robed men, in ones and twos. Was this what they were for? Is this why they stood a stoic guard throughout the city? Did they fight these monsters? They charged, and she heard them die behind her.

She tore down the street, into the shadow of an underpass, still more soldiers passing her. And then she skid to a stop, and whipped her head to look behind her.

There was a child among the scattered flow of soldiers. She wore a black dress with a hood and skipped happily along as though completely unaware of the danger coming toward her. In a flash, Madoka recognized her. She saw her taunting a tin soldier this morning, and caught glimpses of her on the way to school.

A single robed giant swept along the road, toward the underpass.

It wasn't even a choice. She couldn't let a child blunder toward that monster. Madoka turned and sprinted back toward the child, and back toward the monster.

OoOoO

 _'Now let me tell you why that jackass clerk deserves to get his whole store shoplifted out from under him. First off, he was rude as hell when I paid, tried to hit on me then called me a bitch under his breath like he thought I couldn't hear. And I was being nice! I woulda ripped off enough to get him fired if I wasn't living in your house.'_

 _'You really didn't rip him off, did you?'_ Sayaka couldn't muster the focus to be properly annoyed anymore. Madoka should've been here by now.

 _'I told you, I really didn't. Second, he was making it easy as hell, had his nose buried in a porno mag the whole time I was wandering around the store. Even if I'm wearing nice clothes and look all respectable now 'cause of you, there were some other kids in the store who looked like they needed a good meal, you know what I'm saying? Idiot keeps his guard down like that and he deserves what he gets.'_

Kyouko's light chatter on the way back kept her distracted for the last ten minutes, but now Sayaka couldn't ignore the feeling something was deeply wrong. She tuned out Kyouko and focused on the magic in the city around her once again, and swore violently when she realized the miasma was active, moving, and hungry.

It was still to the north, north and a little bit west. Wait. That was directly on the path between her apartment complex and Madoka's house.

 _'Kyouko! Forget the food!'_ she shouted, cutting Kyouko off. _'The wraiths are hunting, meet me there!'_

She transformed into her duelist's uniform with a flash of blue light, threw her window open, and leapt into the air from the fourth floor. She prayed she wasn't too late.

OoOoO

The giant raised its arms like a holy man exhorting the damned, and a golden light gathered at its fingers. The child tensed and crouched, as though ready to burst into motion. She didn't get the chance. Madoka crashed into her from the side and scooped her up, sprinting away as golden light splashed across the ground behind them.

Madoka was a big sister, and big sisterly instincts made her start scolding without even needing to think about it while she ran. "What are you doing? That was dangerous, you dummy!" She emerged from the other end of the underpass and cut to the right, following the hill she'd just gone under.

Other questions bounced around her head. Why was the child here? Where did everyone else vanish to? Where were the police? Where did the monsters come from, how far would they chase her? They flashed through her head without answers or time to think.

"It wasn't dangerous," the child said with an absent airiness. "Help is coming!"

The deep, droning chanting behind her told her the monster was still chasing her. To her right, the hill continued unabated. To her left across the street, a walking park with thick trees that might hide her. But she also wouldn't be able to move as fast, and the monsters might just blast their way through the trees? There was another tunnel through the hill ahead on her right, a bike path. It was much narrower than the underpass, much smaller than the giants chasing her. If she went in the park they'd know where she hid, but if she went in the tunnel they'd have to double back and go through the underpass again to follow her, giving her ground and time to lose them or hide. She ran into the tunnel.

Her heavy breath and feet hitting the ground echoed off the narrow concrete walls; even the lights in this tunnel were dimmed and dying, just like the blocked sun outside. She kept her eyes on the end of the tunnel ahead, planning. After she got out she'd be maybe a minute ahead of them. Should she keep running, or find someplace to hide? But how far would they follow her? She didn't know.

Dirty white robes swept in front of the tunnel exit.

And Madoka suddenly realized—there had been two monsters chasing her, but she'd only seen one following her at the underpass.

No. No no no! The monster at the tunnel end knelt, its torn head filling the exit. Madoka spun around, ready to go back the way she came, but the other giant was already blocking the other exit. No other exits, no other paths. Golden light began to gather at either end of the tunnel.

Madoka sank to the ground, throwing herself over the child she'd failed to rescue. "Close your eyes," Madoka told her. Better not to see it coming. She wasn't going to see Mama and Papa and Tatsuya again, she'd never arrive at Sayaka's place, and she'd never find out why Homura seemed so hurt.

The child tensed underneath her, bracing herself as though ready to throw Madoka off, but then suddenly relaxed. "It's okay," the child said, her voice light. "Good-for-nothing is here now."

The gold light peaked, Madoka clenched her own eyes shut… and as one, the giants bellowed in agony. Their cries died off into silence, and Madoka slowly realized she wasn't dead.

She opened her eyes. Sunlight streamed in from both ends of the tunnel, real sunlight, bright and wholesome. At one end, a girl lowered a black bow. A shield rested on her bow arm, and she was dressed in white, black, and purple. At the other, a girl clenched two swords. A white cloak billowed at her back, and she wore blues and whites out of a swashbuckling movie.

The two girls who saved her looked at each other over her, the one with bow and shield smirking, the one with swords clenching her jaw.

Madoka recognized both of them.

"Sayaka? Homura?"

OoOoO


	2. Chapter 2

.

* * *

OoOoO

 **A Curse Between Us**

 **Chapter 2**

OoOoO

* * *

Sayaka strode forward, sheathing her swords and still glaring at Homura. Madoka slowly rose from the ground. There were so many questions banging around Madoka's head, right alongside panicking instincts still shouting about whether there were more monsters around. Sayaka pulled Madoka away from the child she'd failed to help, then pulled her into a hug.

"Sayaka? What? I don't…"

"You're safe now, I promise."

A familiar hug, even with the strange outfit Sayaka wore. With Sayaka's arms and cloak wrapped around her, maybe she really was safe now? The message slowly trickled down from her brain to her body, and the tension gave way to watery trembling as the adrenaline burned out. "Sayaka, what happened?"

Homura strolled over to them, hands clasped before her. The child with dark dress and hood jumped up and ran over to her, giggling and burrowing into her side. Homura absently patted her head, smiling at Madoka and Sayaka. "Such a touching scene. A happy end to the day's excitement, hmm?"

A burst of pressure like an ocean wave, and a sword appeared in Sayaka's hand pointing at Homura. Madoka flinched. "Stay away from her, Akemi."

"Sayaka!" Another voice, from the same direction Sayaka entered the tunnel. Madoka leaned around the hug and saw a girl with an enormous mane of red hair and red layered clothing. She ran with an enormous crimson spear in one hand, and in the other… a convenience store grocery bag? "Sayaka, I got here quick as I—" She cut off when she saw the sword pointed at Homura. "Blue… don't do anything stupid. Don't piss this one off."

"Listen to your hound, Miki Sayaka," Homura said. "You wouldn't want to upset anyone here, would you?"

"Don't, Sayaka!" Madoka begged. She had no idea what was going on between her two friends, but she wasn't going to let it explode, not here, not after she just escaped one awful terror already. "She helped save me too!"

"I suppose I did," Homura said. "I'd call you ungrateful, Miki, but we both know I saved Madoka of my own inclination, don't we?"

Sayaka tensed, and for one awful moment Madoka was sure there was going to be a fight, but then Sayaka let her sword vanish and forced a smile onto her face. Homura's bow also vanished, and the red-haired girl let out a relieved breath. "I suppose you did help save her, so that gets you some points," Sayaka said. "Now, Madoka was just on her way to my place, so we'll be going…"

"Wait! Isn't anyone going to tell me what's going on?"

The red girl walked over to their group, placing herself almost between Sayaka and Homura but just off to the side. She pulled a box of pocky out from…somewhere, and looked Madoka up and down with a sharp eye as she bit into a stick, clearly dismissing her. She seemed familiar. School! This girl was in her class. Kyouko? Madoka hadn't spoken to her yet, but had noticed she looked bored or tired in lessons. She even fell asleep on her desk in history today, until Sayaka woke her up throwing balled papers at her head. That seemed like it had nothing to do with the sharp-eyed girl in front of her now. Kyouko looked away from her and over to Sayaka. "Alright, your little friend is safe. Now let's call Kyubey over to wipe her memory and be on our merry way, we've got a bag of snacks to eat."

"No one's touching her mind!" Sayaka shouted. "Especially not Kyubey!"

"Geez, the hell is your problem, Blue? You really want her living with the kind of shit we deal with? I mean look at her, she barely has any contract potential far as I can read her. What's the point keeping her in the loop, you need a spunky sidekick to rescue?"

Homura giggled, just a little too pleased.

"I don't care if she can contract or not, I'm not letting Kyubey shred her brain!" Sayaka moved to put herself between Madoka and the others.

"Please! Stop talking about me like I'm not here and tell me _what's going on!_ " Madoka shouted. Sayaka, Homura, and Kyouko stopped and all turned to look at her. Madoka stepped back. "I mean… please?"

"I'm sorry, we're being terrible, aren't we?" Sayaka said. "I'll tell you all about it at my place if you want. That's better than the middle of a biking tunnel."

"I'd rather have my say now," Homura disagreed. "You're not trying to take sweet Madoka all for yourself, are you?"

"I want to hear it now," Madoka said. Not only did she not want to wait, but she was sure Sayaka was just trying to keep Homura away from her again, even though she'd helped.

"Alright then, the quick version," Sayaka said. "I'll start. Those monsters were wraiths. They're born from curses inside human hearts. Fear, anger, loneliness, envy, jealousy, despair, every negative emotion. Normal people usually can't see them until they're pulled into the miasma the wraiths live in, but they hunt humans and drink their spirit. A lot of time when you hear about suicides or people up and disappearing, it was because a wraith got them."

Madoka remembered the bone-deep cold that paralyzed her, and the way the three wraiths grew within the miasma as the cold within her became worse. Had they been… feeding off her? She hugged herself.

"Fortunately, there exist puella magi to fight them," Homura cut in. "We possess magic specialized to destroy wraiths, and we're quite good at it. Mitakihara's wraiths and miasma are somewhat worse than most places, but the city has quite a number of powerful and skilled puella magi. We have it well in hand."

"We still don't save everyone," Sayaka said. "We try, but some people still die. That, and we'll never make wraiths vanish forever, not unless something changes."

"Do recall that her potential is low, Miki," Homura said. "She won't be wishing for any miracles, if that's what you're implying."

"What do you mean potential?" Madoka asked.

"Puella magi are just girls who made a wish and a contract with a being called an Incubator," Sayaka said. "Everyone has different levels of potential power. The contract gives us our powers, and we receive a wish as compensation. From then on, it's our duty to fight wraiths and protect the world."

Kyouko, who'd been standing off to the side leaning disinterestedly on her spear up til now, sent a sharp look at Sayaka. "Oi, there's more to the contract than that, Blue. You give a sales pitch, you damn well better give the fine print."

"You think I'd skip over that? With my own friend?" Sayaka shot back, suddenly angry. "Of course I'd tell her if that's what I wanted!"

"Whoa, okay, fine!" Kyouko threw a hand up in front of her in surrender. "Geez, I didn't fucking mean it like that, Blue. I'm just making sure, right? You're just being fucking weird about this whole thing, that's all."

"Well, Miki?" Homura asked. "I'd love to hear you try to explain the stranger bits."

"Sayaka, what are they talking about?" Madoka asked. "What fine print?"

"There are costs," Sayaka admitted slowly. One hand absently rubbed at her navel—which, Madoka noticed, was covered by a C-shaped gem glowing with cerulean light. "Beyond the obvious fighting, I mean. Later, though. This is the fast version. I'll tell you all of it later." Sayaka laughed lightly. "I mean, it's a lot to take in, isn't it? Just focus on the basics for now. Monsters roam the land, and girls become magical knights to fight them off."

"What were your wishes?" Madoka asked the three.

"My own damn business," Kyouko shot back.

"That's considered an intimate question for puella magi," Homura said. "Perhaps I'll tell you mine sometime?"

"Later," Sayaka repeated. "Not here, not with…" she cut herself off, but it was still clear she didn't want a private conversation with Homura around.

"One thing more you shouldn't forget to mention, Miki," Homura said. "The magic of the world itself fights these monsters. Not so well as we puella magi, certainly, but it lends a hand."

"The tin soldiers?" Madoka guessed.

"Indeed. I know they seem strange, but they'll aid you if you're in trouble. At the very least, they'll stall the wraiths and send up an alarm. Trust them." The child in black, still keeping silent and smiling absently while clinging to Homura's side, nodded confidently at that.

"So there's the too-long version," Kyouko said, jumping back in. "Can we split now? These rice balls aren't going to eat themselves."

"I suppose we've covered the basics," Homura said. "Take this before you go, Madoka. I believe you dropped it earlier." Homura stepped forward and handed Madoka a lidded glass dish. It was… but hadn't she heard the glass breaking? There was a lot happening at the time, but Madoka was sure she heard this shatter. She popped the lid, and looked at the strawberries atop the pink frosting. It was definitely Papa's cake.

Homura took another step forward and touched her shoulders with her hands. "And don't forget about our little outing tonight," she said, leaning in with a secretive little smile. "I'll be waiting for you."

Madoka felt herself growing warm, and almost dropped the cake again. "I won't forget," she promised.

Homura gave her another pleased smile and stepped away, one handing briefly sliding up to touch Madoka's neck as she did. Then she turned and left, disappearing out the tunnel exit without looking back.

OoOoO

Sayaka and Kyouko dropped their transformations in a flash of cerulean and crimson light before they left the tunnel, which Madoka thought was actually really cool. Or, would be, if it weren't for all the monsters. They were just like magical girls. No, they were _real_ magical girls, weren't they? After transforming, Kyouko wore black jean shorts and an emerald green shirt that set off her wild crimson hair and eyes and left her stomach bare. Her clothing looked inexpensive, but new and well cared for. Kyouko seemed to want to get rid of her earlier, but didn't act bothered by her presence now. On the other hand, she didn't look at her much while they walked either. Maybe Kyouko was just ignoring her until she left?

They made their way back to Sayaka's apartment, hurrying at Sayaka's insistence. As soon as they stepped in the door, Madoka let out a sigh of relief.

"Welcome to my humble home," Sayaka said as she tossed her shoes aside. "The crazy girl is Sakura Kyouko, she lives here too. Ah, I had this really stupid joke all ready for when you asked why, about a bet, a DDR machine, and how now she was my waifu, but I guess now I can just say it's so we puella magi can stick together."

"I could still laugh if you want me to?" Madoka offered.

Kyouko snorted. "Don't bother, kid. Pretty sure the wife joke was just to piss me off."

"Of course!"

"The thanks I get for looking after your sorry ass," Kyouko lamented.

Sayaka grinned. "But you're so cute when you're mad!"

"Lucky for me, so is your sorry ass," Kyouko returned, with a fanged grin.

Sayaka was left stammering at that, marking Kyouko the victor of that bout and making Madoka giggle. They retreated to Sayaka's room, where Sayaka lamented how the juice she had laid out had gone warm and Kyouko shouldn't have made her skip the ice. Sayaka and Kyouko jumped right into more banter, and the two of them bickered like they were somewhere between old friends and a straight man/goofball comedy routine, dragging Madoka into their fights whenever possible.

Madoka knew what they were doing, of course. Or rather, what Sayaka was doing. She was trying to keep Madoka engaged and calm and happy and not freaking out about almost dying or everything she'd just learned. Kyouko, on the other hand, just couldn't seem to resist rising to Sayaka's constant bait. Madoka knew what Sayaka was doing, and went along with it. She felt safe with these two.

After obliterating the rice balls in Kyouko's grocery bag, they started in on the cake Papa baked them. Kyouko snatched the dish first and popped the lid open, sending her eyes shooting wide open. "Oh fucking hell, that smells _amazing_." Madoka wasn't sure what she should do first, be scandalized at the scary girl's language or giggle at how she was drooling.

As soon as the first forkful went into Kyouko's mouth, she stopped. After her brain restarted, she rolled the mouthful around carefully, making delighted noises. Then she swallowed and had a second mouthful with a disbelieving face as though she expected the first taste to turn out to be a fluke. "This… this cake… this stuff is better than Mami's!"

"Who's Mami?" Madoka asked.

Sayaka shrugged. "Tomoe Mami, friend of hers. Kyouko swears by her cooking, but I've never had any." She started on her own slice with a look of eager expectation.

"It tastes like strawberries!" Kyouko cried out rapturously.

"It's a strawberry cake," Sayaka said. "There are fresh strawberries right on top of it."

"No no, I mean even the frosting tastes like strawberries, and I don't mean the nasty weird sugar candy version. The frosting tastes like fruit!" Kyouko waved her arms around like wild gesticulations would somehow make the others understand. "Madoka, how the hell did your dad even do that?"

Madoka swelled with pride. "Papa's a great cook!"

"He is," Sayaka said. "It's just like I remember it. Better, even."

Kyouko looked at Sayaka, betrayed. "You used to get food this good without me? There's such a thing as cake even better than Mami's in this world, and you didn't tell me?"

"It's not like I knew you back then…"

Kyouko ignored that and turned to Madoka instead. "We're eating at your place sometime."

"Oi, don't just invite yourself!"

Madoka waved away Sayaka's protest and leaned toward Kyouko. "I'd love having you and Sayaka over! But fair warning, you might get scolded if you swear at the dinner table. Mama always told me 'a young lady shouldn't cuss unless she's got a damn good reason.'"

"I can be good!" Kyouko insisted. And then, at Sayaka's look of disbelief, "What? Really! I can! Scout's honor! Especially if it's for food!"

Sayaka chose not to dignify that, and instead turned to Madoka. "So what's your mom say when you try to call her on her little philosophy there, anyway?"

"Ehihi, she says she got her license to cuss as much as she wants when she had to trade in her young lady card to be an adult."

After cake, they moved onto video games. Sayaka had a new game about squids with paint that she and Kyouko were both really good at. Madoka mostly ran around coloring as much of the level in paint as she could and hoping she didn't run into any enemies. Nine times out of ten, she got splatted unless Sayaka or Kyouko were there to protect her.

After about an hour of video games, Madoka checked the time and reluctantly spoke up between matches. "I should probably leave soon."

"Right, Akemi said something about an outing didn't she?" asked Sayaka.

"I'm… meeting her at a café later," Madoka admitted.

"Really? Huh," Kyouko said. "Thought I heard Akemi wrong when she said that. It was weird enough when she pulled you out of class on your first day, too. Miss Ice Witch doesn't give anyone the time of day."

Madoka shot Kyouko a look as angry as she could manage on short notice, which was still about half pout; Kyouko looked more ready to start laughing than flinch in fear. "Kyouko, her name is Akemi Homura, not Ice Witch. That's not nice at all."

"Already defending her," Sayaka said, fondness and exasperation mixed together. They both gave way to a tight expression, and Sayaka drummed her fingers on the table nervously. "Before you go, there's one more thing I want to talk about."

"Sayaka, what is it?" Madoka asked, putting down her controller. "You… you look worried."

Sayaka laughed, but it sounded forced. "Am I? No, not really. I'm just curious. Did Akemi say anything when she pulled you out of class?"

Madoka fidgeted. "Maybe? Mostly she just showed me around the school, but she also talked a little about… um… philosophy, I guess you could call it?"

Kyouko groaned. "Don't we get enough of that in lit class? If you're going to drag a new friend out of the middle of class, the least you could do is show her the real important shit. Like, where the cafeteria and the good vending machines are and where the teachers don't check when you want to skive off, not try to recruit her for freaking philosophy club. Huh, wait a sec. Akemi's not in any club, I don't think. Other than our 'extracurriculars,' anyway."

Honing in on how uncomfortable Madoka suddenly seemed, Sayaka leaned toward her over the table and fixed her with a stare. "Akemi did something else to you, didn't she?"

"Um…" Madoka blushed crimson, and couldn't meet anyone's eyes.

Sayaka's face contorted with the start of an apoplectic rage. "She did, didn't she?"

"She just gave me a hug!" Madoka blurted out, trying to head off Sayaka's anger.

Sayaka slumped onto the table at the same time Kyouko burst out laughing. "Oh no! So that's what's got Sayaka all tense and pissed off! Akemi works too fast! A hug! That's way too lewd!"

Madoka rushed on. "I mean, it was kind of surprising, but I think it was okay? Really, I didn't mind, Sayaka. Homura could use a hug. She seems like such a lonely person." Her voice dropped to nearly a whisper, talking mostly to herself. "She must be, if she believes what she said."

Sayaka pushed herself up and tried to shut Kyouko up with a death glare, which only made her laugh harder, and said, "Madoka. I bet I can guess the gist of what Akemi said, something about her desires being more important than order or altruism or… anything else, really." She watched Madoka's face, and caught the signs of guilty confirmation in her eyes.

Sayaka sighed. "I thought so. Look. I wanted to talk to you about this before Akemi did, but it's too late for that. There's no way to tell you this without making you mad, so I'm just going to say it. Akemi might seem like she's just lonely, and I know it's in your nature to want to help, but she's a dangerous person. You'd be better off if you stayed away from her."

 _That_ got Kyouko to shut up. The laughter cut off mid-bark and she stared at Sayaka, plainly confused.

Sayaka went on, getting heated. "She'll do anything to take whatever she wants. Nothing's sacred to her! Look, this sounds melodramatic as hell, I get that, but Akemi's a menace!"

"Why would she want to hurt me, though?" Madoka asked. Then she paused, looking at Sayaka, taking in how upset and unsettled she seemed. "No, that's not it. Sayaka, did… did Homura do something to _you_?"

Sayaka shrugged uncomfortably, trying to smile. "Nothing worth mentioning. She's just…" she struggled for words she could safely say, "…not a nice or good person. At all."

Kyouko wasn't looking away from Sayaka. _'_ _Hey. Sayaka. What gives?'_ she asked, in telepathy where Madoka couldn't hear.

Madoka leaned forward, one hand up on the table. "Did she stop you from working as puella magi? Or hurt one of your friends?" Sayaka's face twitched. "Or did she threaten you while you were alone? Did the two of you get in a fight?"

 _'_ _Is this 'cause Akemi's puella magi like us?'_

Sayaka ignored Kyouko entirely and tried to wave off Madoka's concern, but her shoulders were hunched and tight. "Not really," she insisted. "She's just… dangerous."

 _'_ _You gonna tell me what's going on or not, Blue?'_

"Sayaka. Homura asked me to come meet her alone later. Are you saying there's a reason she might try to hurt someone like me?"

Sayaka looked torn for a second, and then like she hated the words coming out her mouth. "If I'm being honest, I'm forced to say she wouldn't. She's not… dangerous quite like that. Just, please, don't trust her too much, Madoka."

 _'_ _Hey, don't you fucking ignore me when I'm talking at you!'_

Sayaka twisted to glare at Kyouko. _'_ _I don't want Madoka around Akemi any more than I can help it, okay?'_

 _'_ _I can't even figure out what the hell you're aiming at here. I almost thought you meant to drag the kid here into our kind of business earlier, but now you don't want her anywhere near other puella magi? Or is this just about Akemi?'_

Sayaka replied with a sullen glare.

 _'_ _Look, if this is just about Akemi, she's not as bad as she acts. If you just ran into her once or twice outside school, I can see where you'd get the wrong idea. I had to deal with her a few times as puella magi before I shacked up with you. Sure, she's got this whole frigid bitch routine down pat, but it's mostly just an act, you know? She doesn't start shit if no one else does. She's not gonna win any personality awards either, don't get me wrong, but far as I can tell she just wants to keep people at arms' length. Hell, I been there before, that's where you found me. If she's taken a liking to your little friend, maybe she'll even defrost a bit. We could use that, Mitakihara's bad enough without the puella magi going for each other's throats all the time.'_

 _'_ _She's dangerous to Madoka!'_

 _'_ _Do you have some reasons you want to share with the class, Miss Miki? 'Cause I don't see why Akemi's going to shank some civvie girl she just met yesterday, unless you know something I don't.'_

"I can leave if you two need to talk…"

Kyouko and Sayaka jumped in their seats at looked at Madoka, who wilted under the attention.

"Um, it's just, you two were glaring at each other but didn't want to say anything? I should go soon anyway."

"Right, your date with Akemi," Sayaka said. "Wouldn't want to cut into that, would I?"

Kyouko shot Sayaka a squinty side eye. "Liiieees," she whispered. "Filthy liiieees."

Madoka blushed at the date comment, but didn't say anything about it. Instead, she asked, "Um, is it… safe for me to walk home?"

"Sure, the wraiths are dead, aren't anymore nearby. They're rare in day anyway." Kyouko said, waving it off.

"I'd feel better if one of us walked you home anyway," Sayaka countered. "Those wraiths shouldn't have been hunting in the first place."

Kyouko opened her mouth to disagree, then shut it. "This is true," she admitted. "Hell, I don't even know what's happening anymore."

"Let me wash your cake dish real fast and I'll walk you home," Sayaka said, getting to her feet.

"I'll pick it up next time," Madoka said. "And… um… actually, would it be okay if Kyouko walked me home?"

Kyouko looked at Madoka, sharp eyes considering. "Okay. Yeah, let's get this out of the way, then."

They stood to go and said their goodbyes. Madoka paused at the door and looked back at Sayaka, who was gathering up dishes and leftover snacks. "You said Homura's dangerous. Are _you_ dangerous, Sayaka?" Madoka didn't shy or flinch away when she said that; her eyes were still trusting and fixed intently on Sayaka's own.

"Not to you, I'm not," Sayaka replied with a smile. "I'd never hurt you."

OoOoO

They walked in silence at first. Madoka didn't know how to start. Kyouko… even when she was making jokes and scarfing down cake, Madoka couldn't forget how easily she'd suggested something like wiping her memories. There was something lean and wolfish about her, even when she was at ease.

After Madoka almost figured out how she was going to ask for the third time in a row, Kyouko sighed in disgust. "Hey, kid. Give me some dirt on Sayaka."

"Eh?"

"C'mon, you two were childhood friends forever ago, right?"

"Since always," Madoka said. "Our mothers were college friends. We grew up together."

Kyouko grinned with mischief. "So you've got all sorts of blackmail on her, right? Gimme something good I can make fun of her for."

Madoka thought a moment. "You know how much she loves music, right?" Kyouko nodded and rolled her eyes, clearly thinking it was hard to miss. "Back in second grade our class learned to play the recorder. It took her about two weeks to understand blowing as hard she could didn't really help. The teacher kept getting really mad at her."

"Aww, that's adorable!" Kyouko said, snickering.

"She'd be all red in the face, twice as loud as everyone around her, huffing and puffing between songs to catch her breath. She kept going so shrill it hurt everyone's ears because she was overblowing, but she still just sat there kicking her little legs and playing away as happy as she could be!"

Kyouko bust up laughing. "What a dork lord! Damn, I'm so going to rig her wakeup alarm to be shitty recorder music now. She'll hate me, it'll be awesome." Kyouko took a deep breath. "Okay then, I'll call that ice broken. Now spit it out, kid."

Madoka let out a squeak. Was she that obvious? …yes, probably, she was. "Well. Um, Kyouko, I know you don't really like me much, and probably think it's none of my business…"

"'S not about not liking you, kid. I just think puella magi and civvies are better off keeping their distance."

"W-well, anyway, I just wanted to ask what's wrong with Sayaka?" Kyouko gave her a calculating look, telling her to go on. "Sayaka is really pushing herself, isn't she? Maybe I just can't read her as well as I used to. But she really seems like she's trying to put on a happy face, and I don't think she should be."

Kyouko snorted. "Yeah, that's definitely a thing she does. Idiot's been all grim and worried for awhile now."

"And Homura," Madoka went on. "Sayaka really doesn't like Homura for some reason. Why? Why is Sayaka closing herself off?"

"Hell if I know."

Madoka looked over in surprise. "What?"

"I said, hell if I know." Kyouko shrugged. "We've been busy, but nothing's gone crunchy wrong. If Sayaka's ever dealt with Homura before, for puella magi business I mean, not just school stuff, then it wasn't while I was around. And far as I can tell, you're the one she's putting up the happy-go-lucky face for."

"What? But why me?"

"Do I gotta say it a third time?" Kyouko gave her an impatient glare, which immediately changed into frustration as Kyouko rubbed her hands to her forehead. "Gah, what the hell do I know, though? Immature wraiths waking up way too early to chase around girls who don't even have a lot of magic to bait 'em, wraiths in broad daylight in the first damn place, Sayaka suddenly has a blood feud with Akemi, Kyubey's up and disappeared… It's like the world got turned upside down and no one remembered to tell me. Sayaka says there's something wronger than usual with the city, and I'm starting to think she's right, but what is she even right about?"

Madoka ran a few steps ahead and stopped in front of Kyouko, blocking her. "Please, Kyouko, if you find out anything about what's worrying Sayaka, anything at all, please tell me! I want to help her."

Kyouko watched thoughtfully, taking in the little puffball desperately blocking her path. "You know, kid, before the wraiths happened and everything went to hell, I was planning on pulling you aside when you got to Sayaka's place. Be scary at you, lean over you and growl a bit, just tell you to keep your distance with Sayaka and not pry 'cause she's got important shit to do, that sort of thing."

"It wouldn't have worked," Madoka declared. "It would just make me worry for her more if you did that."

"Yeah, I'm starting to get that," Kyouko muttered. "You look all mousey at first, and she's a brash idiot, but you two are exactly the same, aren't you? Frigging heroes of love and justice."

"And you're fighting alongside her," Madoka said, challenging Kyouko. "What does that make you?"

"Look. Me and Sayaka…" Kyouko swore violently for a few seconds under her breath. "She helped me out, okay? Real long story short, some bad shit happened, I went wild with grief for awhile, and then Sayaka came along and reminded me what it's like to believe in something. So I owe her, right? And maybe her hero bullshit isn't all bullshit and _why the hell am I telling you all this?_ "

Madoka had been wrong. Kyouko definitely wasn't a wolf. She was a puppy. A great, big, slobbery puppy who just had to be a wolf sometimes. Madoka giggled, grabbed Kyouko's hands in hers, and leaned up to look in her eyes. "Because you care about her, dummy," she said. "And you know I do too, and you're trying to say that even though you don't want me getting caught up in puella magi things, you'll be happy if I can help Sayaka at all."

Kyouko, her hands limp with surrender in Madoka's, stared at her. Her eyes were wide open, exactly as they had been when she'd gotten her first whiff of Papa's strawberry cake. "I think I get why Sayaka was so worked up about you showing up," she said, blush creeping onto her face.

"Eh? What's that mean?"

"Nothing, Pigtails, nothing at all. Come on, we're getting you home." Kyouko pulled her hands free and slid around Madoka to start walking again. As she did, she pulled out one of the infinite boxes of candy she seemed to hide about her person, this one of strawberry hard candies. She popped one in her mouth, and chucked the rest of the box over to Madoka. "In return for the cake," she explained. "And don't expect me to walk you up to the door or nothing, you'll probably be happier if your parents don't see you hanging out with a girl like me."

"Thanks," Madoka said as she caught the candy and threw one in her mouth. Definitely a puppy. "Mama would like you, actually. You're cool and tough, just like her!"

Kyouko shot Madoka a suspicious glare. "Hell is that that supposed to mean, Pigtails?"

"Nothing!" Madoka said it with a singsong lilt and a smile, then rushed to catch up to Kyouko's side.

OoOoO

Madoka found the café Homura told her about without much trouble, reluctantly staying close to all the tin soldiers she saw along the way. It wasn't easy just because she had directions on her phone, either. Mitakihara still felt strange and heavy… and now she knew why… but somehow her feet still knew exactly where to go as soon as she put them onto the sidewalk just as if she hadn't been away for a single day.

She opened the door to a jingle and stepped in. The café itself was a coffee shop decorated in muted colors and dark wood décor. The sparse chatter was low and subdued, and at a quick glance around the room she didn't even see any other teenagers. Maybe she'd gotten the wrong address? She felt so out of place in the happy pastel pink blouse she'd chosen to match her eyes and suddenly childish-seeming pink pigtails. She'd been expecting someplace more… she wasn't sure. She couldn't really imagine Homura choosing someplace bright and cheery that all the girls in their class might flock to for afterschool gossip.

She was about ready to pull her phone out to double check the address when she spotted dark purple eyes, far back in a lonely corner of the shop. With a start, she realized Homura was watching her, eyes half-closed, mouth playing at smiling, and chin propped languorously on one hand, some predatory animal waiting contentedly for its next meal to wander into an ambush. Madoka's pulse started racing when she felt the weight of those eyes on her.

Everything Sayaka said pushed its way to the forefront of her mind, and she wondered if she should just leave. But Homura had already spotted her and Madoka knew she wouldn't try to lie about an excuse tomorrow if Homura asked why she skipped. Besides that…

Seeing Homura lurking in the dim corner booth, she could believe what Sayaka said about her being dangerous, but some part of Madoka's heart still begged her to believe that Homura would never hurt her. Homura helped _save_ her!

Even more, something was wrong with Sayaka, and Homura might know what. Madoka needed to figure out what was going on and how she could help, and surely she'd be a step closer to that if she could become Homura's friend first. And if it turned out to be because of something Homura did... well, being someone Homura might listen to would definitely help then.

She started walking. The scents of coffee and desserts and the chatter of the café all faded away as she walked to Homura's table. Everything vanished, replaced entirely by a sleek smile and midnight purple eyes.

"Madoka." Homura said it slowly, savoring her name, and waved her into the other seat. "You came. I wondered if you might run away. You had a hard day, and I gave you a bit of a fright yesterday."

"The hug? I… don't think I mind." And… something else? Had Homura done anything else on the glass bridge at school? Sayaka had expected something like that. But it had happened so quickly and been so out of the blue that her memory was fuzzy. "Oh! Thank you again for the ribbons, Homura! They're already my new favorites!"

"Not at all. They look better on you, as I said." Homura unconsciously touched her own dark headband she'd replaced the ribbons with. "What would you like to order? My treat."

"Anything's fine. I don't want to be a bother." That, and she wasn't sure what a place like this would even have that she'd like. Mama was the only one in their family who really liked coffee, but she didn't want to make Homura feel bad about the place she'd picked.

"Hmm." Homura smirked as though she knew exactly what Madoka was thinking. "I'll order for us, then."

She called over a waitress and started to order, but Madoka lost the conversation almost immediately and found herself staring at Homura instead. Along with the dark headband and her strange single earring with the glinting purple gem, Homura wore a black long-sleeved blouse, and when she was walking to the table she'd seen Homura's long skirt was just as dark. Bursts of some crimson spiny-looking flower were embroidered along the sleeves and collar and up the side of her skirt. The flower seemed familiar. Maybe there were some in Papa's garden? The outfit was pretty and suited Homura, but somehow sucked away cheer from the room.

She found her gaze pulled back to Homura's single earring. A black metal band shaped like a lizard wrapped around the rim of her ear, and from it hung that purple gem cut into a kite shape and set in gold or brass or something. It was glowing faintly, now that she looked at it, and reminded her of the C-shaped cerulean gem Sayaka wore. The amethyst light pulsed slowly, almost like it was responding to Madoka's attention. Her hands twitched. She wanted to reach out and touch it, see if it was as warm as she thought it would be. Madoka's breath slowed down, matching the gem's hypnotic pulse as she stared at it.

With a start, she realized Homura was watching her, looking amused and smug. The waitress was already gone. Madoka felt a blush rising. She'd just been caught staring at Homura, hadn't she?

Thankfully, Homura didn't point it out. "They work quickly here. Our food will be out soon, but we have some time to chat."

"If you don't mind, um, I'm still a little curious about puella magi…"

"Not today," Homura said, briefly silencing Madoka by reaching out and putting one finger over her lips before withdrawing. "You don't need to worry about it now. I told you earlier, we have the wraiths well in hand. Let's enjoy ourselves for now. There will be time enough for destiny and striving later."

Madoka wasn't sure how to take that… but she could wait awhile if she needed to. "Let's just have fun now," she agreed.

Homura smiled, pleased. "Well then. Tell me Madoka, how are you settling back into Mitakihara?"

"I'm still adjusting. It's… better, now that I have friends here."

"I'm glad. Did you enjoy spending time with Miki and Sakura?"

"Yes! We had cake my Papa baked and played video games." Madoka smiled. "I also found out Kyouko's a lot nicer than she thinks she is."

An amused smirk flashed over Homura's face and was gone. "Indeed she is," she agreed. "Be sure you take care of Miki as much as you can. The work of puella magi isn't easy on her."

"I noticed…"

"How are you sleeping lately?"

"I'm…" _Curse me!_ "Not well."

"Pity. I hope that goes better for you. Are you enjoying time with your family?"

"We've been… a little scattered? The move took a lot out of everyone." Madoka worked at paper napkin, tearing little rips in it as an excuse not to look at Homura. "Um… I don't mind talking about myself at all, but... could you tell me something about yourself?"

"Ah, it's rude of me to sit here and interrogate you, isn't it?" Homura looked a bit… worried? She hid it well, but she looked worried like her barrage of questions had damaged something. "What would you like to know?"

"It doesn't have to be anything big or about puella magi yet! Just anything is fine. I feel like I want to know you better. Um, how about, what's your favorite TV show?"

Homura hesitated a moment. "I haven't followed any television in years, actually."

The waitress arrived with their food, giving Madoka time to parse that and think of something else. It turned out that Homura had ordered Madoka a small plate of mixed cookies and a peach Italian soda; it was probably the sweetest thing the café served. Homura had gotten herself some sort of tall coffee, which she loaded up with sugar and cream. Madoka had to suppress a giggle at the unexpectedly cute sight. Somehow she expected Homura would take her coffee bitter and black. Homura seemed to notice Madoka's mirth, but went right on pouring a fourth pack of sugar anyway.

After a few bites of a peanut butter cookie, Madoka had another idea. "Okay, what was your favorite toy on the playground when you were little?"

Homura's hand slipped, and half of sugar packet number five went over the table. "I… don't remember if I've ever been on a playground."

"What? But everyone's been on a playground, haven't they?"

"I had a dangerously weak heart when I was much younger. I spent most of my youth in hospitals." Homura looked stricken as she admitted that. "Maybe I played on one sometime before I was… four or five, perhaps, but that was too long ago to remember."

She looked so ashamed admitting it that Madoka's heart swelled up in sympathy. Was that why she seemed so lonely, and why she'd all but jumped at the chance to talk to a new transfer student? If she wasn't used to being around other kids her own age and hadn't made friends after getting out of the hospital, then had all her time taken up by being puella magi… "It's okay Homura, you don't need to be sorry for having health problems!"

"That's not it, I was just sorry I don't have better answers for your questions."

Madoka knew she was giving Homura a very confused look right then. "Is that all?" Then something occurred to her. "Oh, is that what your wish was? To fix your heart?" The question slipped easily from her mouth, even as she remembered with some horror how Homura had said asking a puella magi about their wish was considered very private. "I mean—sorry!"

"Don't apologize," Homura said, and looked like she meant it. "But no, it wasn't. I healed my heart with magic after contracting."

"That's amazing, Homura!" Since Homura wasn't volunteering anything more about her what her wish actually was, Madoka guessed she didn't want to share yet. After a asking a question like that, Madoka needed something to break up the awkwardness, and she had an idea. "Oh, and finish your coffee." Madoka suited her own advice by shoving her last two cookies in her mouth whole and munching them down as quickly as she could.

Homura blinked at her in confusion, but went back to her drink anyway.

OoOoO

"Come on!"

"But… but why?"

Madoka giggled as she all but dragged Homura by the hand over long grass. "You'll see!"

It had been scary at first, grabbing Homura's hand outside the café. She'd half expected Homura to either bolt or seize her. Still, as they'd talked in the café, Homura's confident and sleek manner had fallen away by degrees, letting Madoka get glimpses of worry and need, and that gave her enough confidence to reach out. Homura's hand was surprisingly thin, almost bony. After a few minutes, holding Homura's hand inside hers as they walked felt perfectly natural.

The orange glow of evening cast itself over the park, slowly changing to the purple of twilight. Flowing brooks cut through immaculate sweeps of lawn. If her memory was right, further back in the park there were rolling hills of flowers and walking paths with gazebos to stop at for rest, but for now she ran across the grass and headed for a playground, heart light with carefree motion. They almost had the entire park to themselves as everyone else vanished back into the city with the setting sun, and the few other people around were just little blotches of fading color in the distance.

When they reached the playground, Madoka let go of Homura's hand and leapt as high as she could over the tiny divider separating grass from woodchips. The playground wasn't as big as she remembered it, of course, but it was still bright and large enough. She spun around to see Homura hanging at the edge of the grass. "Come on, Homura! You have to play on a playground at least once in your life! Don't let anyone tell you you're too old for it!"

Homura looked at the tangle of metal bars and jutting plastic as though it was about to bite. "I don't know if I'll be able to enjoy something like this anymore…."

"Silly, that's a terrible reason not to try!" Madoka ran back and dragged Homura forward by the hand. "Now what should get on first? They have everything here! There are slides and swings and monkey bars and spring horses and fire poles and the spinny thing and the jungle gym.

"Spinny thing?" Homura raised an eyebrow. "Is that what it's called?"

"I have no idea! My little brother Tatsuya loves it, though!" Madoka ran over to a bright blue plastic toy that looked like a miniaturized merry-go-round with rails and treaded surface instead of canopy or seats. "One person stays off the toy and spins it around from the outside, and everyone else sits on it and gets really dizzy! I just push it slowly when Tatsuya's on it, of course, and he crawls around the middle."

Homura looked at the thing like she had just been told it would summon up the faerie queen of candyland and she was trying to decide whether to play along or not. "I… see. And this is fun?"

"Of course! Do you want to try it?"

"If you think I'll enjoy it, I will." Homura gracefully hopped onto the spinny thing and took a seat halfway between the edge and the center, one hand gripping a rail and looking focused and determined.

Madoka grabbed a rail around the edge and started running to get it up to speed, making Homura squawk as it shifted beneath her. As soon as they were moving fast enough to find, Homura's elegant black hair came undone and went flapping about her face, blinding her. Madoka couldn't help but laugh a bit, and let go of the spinny thing. Instead of running with it, she stood in place and pushed the handrails to keep it going as they passed, and Homura became a big dark blur rushing by her. "What do you think?"

"I'm not sure yet!" Homura shouted from a center of whipping hair.

"Maybe you need to come closer to the outside! You move faster there!"

"Alright, I will!"

Homura brought up a hand to push the hair out of her face and stood while the spinny thing was still going at full speed. Madoka stared as Homura, with perfect balance and only one hand lightly touching the rail, began walking toward the edge. She came to a stop barely inches from where the surface ended, leaning perfectly into the motion to stay upright. Her hair and her long skirt flowed out behind her, the clothing's fabric snapping in the wind. And, then as if that wasn't enough, Homura jumped from the ride, skirt billowing, and landed gracefully on her feet.

Madoka rushed over to her. "Wow, Homura! I didn't mean move right away while it was going, but that was amazing! Sayaka used to walk on the spinny thing when we were little kids, but only when she was holding the rails tight. You must have amazing balance!" Madoka herself had never worked up the courage to try it as a child, even when Sayaka tried to talk her into it. The number of times Sayaka had gotten thrown off trying to stand had dissuaded her from imitating her more adventurous best friend.

"Ah, I just had to lean into the motion properly to stay up." Homura was caught off guard at Madoka's enthusiastic praise, like she didn't understand why she was being complimented and didn't know how to handle it. "Puella magi have improved bodies. It was simple."

In that case, Sayaka would probably stand on _top_ of the rails if she tried this sort of thing again now. Madoka giggled at the mental image. "Well? Did you have fun?"

Homura hesitated a second. "I don't think I enjoy things that spin around. The jump was fun, though."

"You should try the swings then! You swing higher and higher until you're ready, then slide out of your seat at the top and go flying. Oh, but don't do that in front of Tatsuya if you ever take him to the park with me, okay? He doesn't need more ideas." She ran over to the swings and claimed one, kicking her legs to build momentum. Homura took the next seat, tied a knot near the bottom of her skirt for modesty, and followed suit.

Madoka gently pushed Tatsuya on the swings all the time, but it had been years since she'd been on one herself for anything more vigorous than a bit of back-and-forth that barely took her feet off the ground, so her stomach felt a little confused at this nonsensical flip-flopping motion. Still, it wasn't anywhere near as bad as sprinting flat out to escape giant monsters, so she threw herself into it with glee and kicked herself higher and higher.

The swingset frame rocked back and forth now that two teenagers were throwing their full weight at it. Madoka called out happily to Homura. "Are you having fun?"

"Yes! This is much better than the spinny thing!" Homura's voice came and went as they swung past each other.

Then Madoka remembered a game she and Sayaka used to play on the swings. "Homura, match me, and we can jump off together!"

Madoka got a glimpse of Homura's smile, or several glimpses in sequence as they passed each other. Homura pumped her legs harder to change her timing, slowly bringing the two of them into line. Then Madoka got more than a passing glimpse of Homura's smile; she was breathless and grinning with suppressed laughter, looking nothing like the strange, self-possessed girl she'd been earlier.

That grin sent an electric thrill through Madoka. She'd spent so long waiting to see Homura happy like this, carefree and light hearted. She'd had to watch Homura struggle under an unending burden, had to wait until she could finally lift it from her shoulders. On an impulse, Madoka stretched one hand out to Homura, and her stomach did a swoop when Homura reached back and their fingers tangled up together.

And then, when the time to came to welcome her home, Homura… she… she had…

What was she thinking? Her heart was pounding. Her head felt ready to fall off.

"Madoka! Let's jump together!" Homura's face was lit up in glee.

Dizzy. Madoka opened her mouth to say she wasn't feeling well, but the words got stuck in her throat. Woodchips and green lawn and purple sky flip-flopped and pushed each other out of the way, and as she flew toward the apex of the swing's arc, there was…

…there was something hanging up in the sky, catching the last ray of light as the sun disappeared, something dark and flying. No, something hanging…

 _The monument-tomb of a girl, arms outstretched in sympathy, arraigned in power. Black streaks bled down her legs, the mark of fingers clawing unworthily at her glory in fervent adoration. The Goddess's eyes, though kind and knowing, were stone and saw nothing._

The swing slipped out from beneath her. With a start, she tried to grab at the chains as they fell away, but she wasn't even sure she grabbed in the right direction. She was weightless, dark clouds swarmed around her.

 _The sound of weeping echoed around the stone; a lost girl laid prostrate before the tomb, face against the ground and long black dress spread out behind her. A pair of arms with skin pale as porcelain and bare from the elbow emerged from the heap of black cloth, and delicately crafted hands clutched her head, tangled up in her dark hair._

She didn't have her feet under her, and she was falling. Madoka had only a heartbeat to let the panic set in before Homura caught her deftly out of the air.

"Stop it Madoka, this is dangerous." Homura frowned intently as she lowered Madoka to the ground, her breathless smile instantly gone. "The wraiths can taste your magic when you're like this."

Madoka twisted, groaning, woodchips digging into her back. The air around them was shimmering, a quickly-darkening haze that pressed in around them, cloying and hungry. Homura was right, they were looking at her. A searing, pulsing light sat inside her heart, trying to push its way outward. "Homura," Madoka begged. "It hurts. What did you do to me?"

Homura looked around at the dark fog and cursed under her breath. She raised a hand and a purple light burst outward from it. The miasma broke apart and dissolved, dying with a silent scream of hate. "Please Madoka, please believe me! I'll protect you, I'll do everything to protect you, but the wraiths will come back if you keep doing this. You need to relax, you need to let go. Please, don't you trust me?"

Homura's hands cupped her face. Homura herself was on the verge of tears. Through the pain, disjointed thoughts she didn't understand tried to answer. Yes, Homura loved her, she would never hurt her. No, Homura wasn't well, she needed help first. She couldn't make sense of it, let alone decide. But the earnest terror in Homura's eyes swayed her. "I trust you," she promised.

"Then please, just relax. The wraiths will be back if you keep doing this. Just let it go."

Madoka did her best, putting her own hands over Homura's and breathing deep, trying to push everything away. The searing light pulsing in her heart dimmed and vanished. Homura let out a relieved breath.

"Are you alright?" Homura asked.

"I'm fine, I'm sorry," Madoka said. Her thoughts were fuzzy, and she still felt dizzy. "What happened?"

"You have nothing to apologize for. You got motion sick and fell from your swing," Homura said.

Madoka blinked slowly a few times. That made sense? "You caught me. Thank you."

She must be out of it still. She didn't think she was going to throw up, but for a second Madoka thought she saw a little girl in mourning black looking at her from around Homura's side. A trick of the light as her head tried to make the world stop wobbling and slot back into place. This one had locks and locks of curly black hair piled on top of her head. No, it wasn't a trick of the light, she really did see her. Almost like the other one, the one with the hood with an orange knit bobble she saw around the wraiths.

Homura half-turned toward the child, who leaned up and whispered in her ear before disappearing. Homura turned back toward her. "I'm afraid we've overdone it. I'll take you home after you've had a moment to rest, and then I have some puella magi affairs to attend. I'm sorry our outing turned out badly for you."

"It's fine, I'll survive a little motion sickness! I'm already feeling better," Madoka protested, and then proved her words by gingerly sitting up. "I'm glad I came to see you tonight, Homura." The look Homura gave her was less than convinced. "Really, I am! I got to know you a little better. Weren't you happy tonight too?"

Homura peered at her as though trying to determine her sincerity, and Madoka did her best to look trustworthy. After a moment Homura's eyes softened, and she said, "Yes, I did. If you enjoyed it, then so did I." Quietly, without explaining why, she added, "I'm sorry."

Even with the dizziness, playing around in the open like this was so much better than sitting in a dark café, dissecting unspoken meanings and worrying about making Homura angry with the wrong word. Homura seemed lonely. She seemed content to act aloof and intimidating in passing, yet she also jumped at the chance to spend time with a new transfer student. Madoka didn't know why. Something was wrong with all of them, with Homura and Sayaka.

After a moment of rest, Homura walked her home. When they said goodbye at the front door, she gave Madoka a smile. It wasn't sleek and enticing like the ones she'd worn in the café. It was tenuous, uncertain, but also warm.

Madoka would just have to strengthen that smile, until Homura trusted her enough to tell her everything.

OoOoO

Sayaka, crouched in shadows, watched Mitakihara middle school. It looked different under the cover of night, a lonely abandoned castle of glass. But even though the school was dark, the ambient light from stars and the surrounding city was more than enough to navigate by.

She dashed through the grounds, cape fluttering behind her, trusting to shadows and her speed to keep her from unfriendly eyes. The glass face of the building was sleek, but she sprung up it anyway, light feet finding footholds and bounding between facing walls. She could have summoned up her musical platforms and simply flew straight up the entire height of the building, but she needed to avoid the notice that came with flashy magic right now. She climbed up the side of the enormous ornate fence bordering the roof, twisted in the air above its arches, then fell onto the school roof in almost soundless crouch.

"Welcome, Miki Sayaka. Would you care for tea?"

Sayaka's sword leapt into her hand. "Akemi! What are you doing here?"

Homura lounged on one of the roof's benches, legs pulled up beneath her and resting on a cushion to soften the stone. A second cushion sat on the other end of the bench, and between them was a full tea service on a purple-trimmed dining cloth. Akemi took a long sip of a cup and shrugged, an elegant, sinuous motion. "I have no reason not to be here. It's a lovely night, after all. Let's sit and talk. I'm in an excellent mood after spending the evening with Madoka."

"Are you fucking with me?" Sayaka snarled.

"So unpleasant, Miki. If we're going to be spending this world together, you should practice some decorum. If only for the sake of appearances. Why don't you put away that unnecessary sword and come have a cup?"

"I won't play coy with you when we're alone, devil. What did you do to her?"

Homura chuckled lightly, smiling knowingly. "What did I do to whom?"

"You know who I mean, Akemi!"

"Yes, I do. But I'd rather hear it from your lips anyway."

Incensed, Sayaka brought her sword to position, ready to charge. Homura's eyes narrowed, and the danger playing about her smiling lips held Sayaka at bar. "Bastard," Sayaka spat.

"How about this, Miki? Play my little game and tell me who you mean, and I swear I shall tell you what I've done with her. I give you my word."

Sayaka held position for a long moment considering this, face still angry. Finally, she must've decided either she had nothing to lose by speaking or Homura could be trusted to keep her word, because her sword point drifted downward. "I don't know who she is," Sayaka admitted.

Homura arched an eyebrow. "Hmm?"

"While out patrolling, I got a message from a girl who wanted to meet me here. She said she knew about… us. You and me and Madoka. She wouldn't say what was going on, just to get here as fast as I could."

"But you heard her mind's voice by telepathy, right? Who was she?"

Sayaka snarled again. "I don't know! I didn't recognize her voice! Now stop mocking me, devil, and keep your promise!"

"Absolutely nothing, of course."

Sayaka's blade drifted up again, her hand tense on the hilt. "If you're lying to me…"

Mirth dancing about her eyes, Homura raised her cup of tea to Sayaka in toast. "Nothing at all! I simply beat her here and met you first! Now run along, dear Miki. I'm the only one you'll find here tonight."

Sayaka cursed and stood there for a moment, quivering like an angry dog at the end of a chain as Homura silently chortled at her. Then Sayaka turned to the fence, preparing to jump.

"We'll both be happier once you stop fighting and accept this world," Homura called out, voice suddenly serious. "That's the only way it will stop hurting."

Sayaka paused briefly, scowling, but said nothing. Then, cloak, fluttering behind her, she launched herself off the roof and into the night.

Homura took a long sip of tea. Her dark eyes flicked over to the shadows of the roof's entrance. "Amusing. You can come out now, Nagisa." A squeak came out of the shadows. "I won't ask again. I had to cut short my time with Madoka to meet you here, so we might as well make the most of it. Come sit down and have a cup, Bebe."

Nagisa stepped timidly from the shadows, wearing the cat-eared black cap and light red shawl of her puella magi transformation. She stopped with several benches between her and Homura, too scared to come closer. "…what did you _do_ to her?"

"She was being difficult, so I helped her fit into my new world better," Homura said, as if patiently explaining the obvious and reasonable. "Her status as a herald of the Law of Cycles and her memories of the previous worlds were causing trouble, so I stripped them away. She still rather hates me, but I'll not take that away from her. As if I even could."

Homura laughed, then added, half to herself, "After all, her feelings are hers alone, a heaven and hell of her own making, and to strip them away would be a sin even I won't stoop to. I've finally learned at least that much."

"You… you just cut her off from the Law of Cycles? From Oktavia? How?"

"I am the devilish god of this new world, and the Law of Cycles is in my grasp." Homura took a sip of her tea. "It was simple."

Nagisa took a few steps back, looking at Homura with new terror. "What are you going to do to me?"

"What am I going to do to you?" Homura let the question hang in the air, savoring it, before shrugging. "Nothing, of course, so long as you don't force my hand. Righteous fury bound dear Sayaka to rashly act against me, so I took away her tools. Don't follow her example, Nagisa."

"She didn't remember me when I asked her to meet me…."

"I told you, I stripped away her memories as well. You heard it from her own mouth, did you not? The Miki Sayaka who belongs in this world has never met the Momoe Nagisa of this world or the last. Poor Sayaka likely doesn't even remember why she's fighting me, only that she must. And what about you?"

Defiance would anger Homura, but Nagisa couldn't bring herself to say she would abandon Sayaka and Madoka, either. She stayed silent, wringing her hands and looking at the ground.

Homura watched Nagisa's indecision. "Hmm. For what it's worth, I do apologize for our little misunderstanding back when I thought you were the one keeping us inside a labyrinth.." Homura chuckled lightly. "I gave you quite a scare, browbeating you like that, when really the labyrinth was my own doing all along. Silly of me."

Pique and loyalty overcame fear and sense for a moment. "And what about hurting the goddess after? Are you sorry for that?" And Nagisa slapped her hands over her mouth.

Homura didn't move, but tensed, and her languid rest suddenly lost all sense of ease and repose. Her eyes were hard and hateful.

Flight trampled over both fight and loyalty in its haste, and with a cry Nagisa spun about and fled right into a wall of spears. A ring of armed Clara dolls surrounded her, their eyes gleaming with hungry red light and giggling childishly with sharp smiles.

Homura set her tea cup down on its plate with a firm _clink_. " _Sit_ , Bebe."

Nagisa walked slowly over to Homura's bench at spearpoint. One of the Clara dolls fluffed the second cushion for Nagisa, then bowed as she sat across from Homura.

"Drink."

The tea cup rattled against its saucer as Nagisa picked it up, and again as she set it down after forcing down half its contents.

Homura rose from her seat and walked around Nagisa within the circle of Clara dolls, then sat behind her on the bench. Her fingers slid into Nagisa's hair and began pulling through its thick strands. Homura hummed to herself quietly; Nagisa flinched when she felt Homura's fingers press at the back of her neck. "Such lovely hair. Such a lovely child. Don't you think so, Bebe?"

Nagisa whimpered.

"Children should answer when spoken to, Bebe."

"M-Mama liked my hair too. And… and so did Madoka."

Fingers slid down Nagisa's neck, and fingernails like daggers pierced her shoulders in a vice grip. "Tell me, Bebe. When you came to meet Sayaka, why did you think I'd let you get away with it?" Her breath was hot against Nagisa's ear; her voice lost all pretension of warmth.

"I'm sorry, Miss Akemi! I won't do it again!"

"Just answer, Bebe."

"I hoped you wouldn't be watching me! I thought you'd watch Madoka first!" Nagisa, on the verge of tears, squirmed uselessly in Homura's grip. "Miss Akemi, please, you're hurting me!"

Homura finally released her. Nagisa pulled away and slumped forward. Homura leaned back, but remained seated behind Nagisa. "So you hoped to meet with Madoka's strong right hand Miki Sayaka and plan how to take Madoka back while I was busy enjoying my spoils, yes?"

Nagisa, shuddering in place and hugging herself, had no answer.

"But as you saw," Homura went on, "Dear Sayaka is in no condition to plan anything, so you'll find no help there. Worse, even if my attention isn't on little insignificant you, you're still being watched. You've met my mourners already, haven't you?"

At Homura's gesture, one of the Clara dolls stepped forward from the ring surrounding the bench and bowed. She wore a skirt and a blazer over a pale buttoned shirt, and her curly hair was piled up atop her head. She did not looked at Nagisa and Homura as she rose from her bow, and her hungry red eyes dimmed to a troubled yellow now that she was singled out from her fellows.

"This is Okubyou," Homura said. "It means Cowardice, and she suits it well. She is still more than enough to watch you, and that is exactly the task I've set her. If you do anything rash, pray she deals with you herself rather than telling me. I also have another little helper I've finally brought to heel."

The pleasure in Homura's voice as she spoke the last bit was obvious. Nagisa looked around uncertainly, then spotted it. Just outside the ring of Clara dolls, a billowing white tail swished back and forth as four paws paced along the row of feet, twining through the Clara dolls' legs. Kyubey stopped to sit on its haunches, and turned its stoic crimson eyes to peer at her wordlessly.

"Help me, Madoka," Nagisa begged, silent tears running down her face. "Please, please, help me!"

"Even if you dodge my mourners and I can't be bothered, Kyubey is watching everything in this world for me," Homura went on, not acknowledging Nagisa's slow breakdown. "Do you understand your position, Bebe?"

Nagisa quietly swallowed a sob.

"I asked a question."

"Y-yes," Nagisa choked out.

"Good. For now, all I want you to do is stay away from Sayaka and Madoka. Don't approach them. Don't tell them anything they don't need to know about the Law of Cycles, the old world, or yourself. You'll likely see Sayaka now and then because you are both puella magi in the same city, but don't be alone with her. Break my law by doing any of these, and I will tear you from Charlotte and the Law of Cycles and rip out your memories of the old world just as I did to Sayaka. Do you understand?"

Nagisa nodded, head hanging.

"Lovely." Homura stood, walked out from behind Nagisa, and picked up her cup of tea from the bench and sipped down the last of it. "Now run along, Nagisa. We'll talk again later. You're staying with Mami now, aren't you? You mustn't be away from her too long. She gets so lonely, after all. Be sure to enjoy her cake when she offers it. Mami's table is always excellent."

Trembling, Nagisa rose from the bench. The circle of Clara dolls vanished from sight. Okubyou, still looking uneasy, vanished last of all… and yet, Nagisa's magic senses still felt her jailer's presence, a wispy darkness hanging around her mind without any obvious source, and she knew she was being watched. It was almost like she remembered a witch's familiar feeling like, yet subtly different, less oppressive, more natural against the ambient sensations of the world. She looked at Homura, who was neither a magical girl nor a witch nor a goddess like Madoka, but something of all of them twisted together. Homura looked back over her tea cup, a teacher smiling indulgently at an unruly child whose sullenness means nothing and accomplishes nothing. Nagisa retreated, walking backwards to not let Homura out of her sight. She got to the fence at the edge of the roof before she dared turn away and prepare to leap. Hands clamped around her arms.

"You asked if I was sorry for what I did to Madoka," Homura hissed in her ear. "That is the one thing I will never, _ever_ regret. She cast herself into outer darkness to bear our burdens, but I will not let her suffer for our sakes any longer. This paradise will keep her safe, and I will not let anything or _anyone_ stand in the way of that." Homura's grip vanished. "Now, go."

Nagisa fled.

OoOoO

Above Mitakihara, the half-moon shone down on the city, stars peeking through its vacant side. The sky was vivid, even though Mitakihara's own lights never slept. Lives went on beneath the night sky. On the grassy cliffs above the city, one girl in particular had no need for sleep tonight. She danced, eyes closed and a smile on her face, feet taking her through the flowered hills and up to the cliff edge indiscriminately and fearlessly as she swayed, black hair twirling about her and orbited by a purple gem the shape of a crown.

What reason was there to sleep fitfully tonight? Why not rather dance? The stars and the severed moon bore witness to this world she had made, this paradise that housed her desires. True, there was a darkness over the city. Even though the little lives of humans limped onward without pause, there was a sickness at the heart of it. Even though the lights of the city never went out, there was a miasma of darkness choking those same lights to the eyes of those who knew how to see it.

But what of that? The presence of miasma meant there was work to be done, but when had that not been true? There were puella magi to push back the darkness, as there ever were.

There was a curse deep at the heart of this city, a darkness thicker than any simple miasma of wraiths. It was burrowed deep beneath the city's roots, sending its poison upward. It growled and snarled in her mind, screaming at her senses. If she stood aside idly, it would become an abyss that devoured the world.

But what of that? She twirled through a few more steps inches from the edge of the cliff, posed for an audience below that did not see and could not know. The Great Curse meant to swallow this world, but Madoka did not hate her yet, despite everything. Madoka looked at her with kind eyes. Madoka could fritter away her time in coffee shops and playgrounds without worry, and was happy to have Homura alongside her. Dealing with the Great Curse to preserve this paradise would be trivial compared to making Madoka smile. Homura giggled and fell backwards, collapsing into a bed of thick grass and gazing up at the stars.

She rolled over onto her stomach and looked at the fields behind her. White-furred abominations lay in heaps among the gently-swaying flowers. Here one lay twitching in a thick patch of orange lilies, its long ear-things trembling. There another lay still beneath stalks of pink snapdragons, eyes unfocused. The scenes of grotesque repose certainly brought yet another smile to her lips, but she wanted a functional model at the moment. "Kyubey," she called.

Almost instantly, the Incubator was there, padding out from a patch of shadows. It stared at her without speaking, enormous tail swaying back and forth.

"Tell me Kyubey, what do you think of this world of mine?"

 _'It seems rather precarious. The wraiths seem quite drawn to the sealed magic within Kaname Madoka. On top of that, I also noticed that she had another incident today at the park. Are you quite certain you severed her from the Law of Cycles as thoroughly as you meant to?'_

Ah, and there was the rub, the one mar on her paradise. "Madoka's incidents and her attractiveness to wraiths will both vanish when she fully accepts my world," Homura said frostily. She cast a baleful eye over Kyubey. "Don't approach her," she reminded it. "Do so, and I'll make you suffer."

Kyubey's tail stopped swaying and went flat. _'More so, you mean?'_

"I'm sure I can come up with something." Homura smiled at the thought. "Besides that, satisfy my curiosity, won't you Incubator? If I had let Madoka take me at the end instead of pulling her down from her heaven, what would your next move have been? I won't bother asking if you think you really could have eventually chained her yourself. After all, you have such a habit of underestimating puella magi. But what about just your next step?"

 _'More experiments would have been necessary to observe the mechanisms of the Law of Cycles. Thankfully, Tomoe Mami and Sakura Kyouko now had first-hand knowledge of the Law of Cycles's anthropomorphized form known as Kaname Madoka. They would have been used as subjects for modified versions of the same isolation field you were placed in. Why do you ask?'_

"And, of course, Mami and Kyouko's contacts among puella magi might be drawn into their own labyrinths, letting them meet Madoka face to face and giving you yet more candidates." Homura laughed. "And you were getting so used to doing with us as you pleased, too. It must be frustrating to find goddesses who can disturb your precious plans!"

 _'Why do you ask?'_ Kyubey repeated.

Homura sat up, stretching fluidly, and smirked. "No reason in particular. I'm merely savoring my victory."

 _'A victory where your comrades hate you? A victory where the Law of Cycles' anthropomorphized form could break out at any moment? She'll hate you too when she finds out what you've done.'_

"They _should_ hate me. They have every right. Sayaka already does, and of course the others will if they find out what I've done to them. But not Madoka. She's far too good to hate."

 _'You hardly sound convinced of that, Akemi Homura.'_

"She won't! She couldn't. She knows I'm doing this for her. For us. For all of us." Homura ran a hand over and alongside her head, where she had worn Madoka's ribbon until returning it the other day. Her eyes trembled; she let out a strained giggle. "Madoka will never hate me. Even if she breaks my power, even if she pulls me from her throne, even if she casts me down into darkness, she will never hate me." She took a deep, rattling breath and shot a hateful glare at Kyubey, longing to pluck his head from his throat and silence him. "Go. Leave me to my thoughts."

As Kyubey's functional body slipped away into the night, Homura turned her attention to the city beneath her, letting the sight of it calm her. Lives went on, indeed. In the Tomoe apartment, Mami was humming as she fixed up a guest bed for Nagisa, who was making drowsy protests that she wanted to stay up longer. When Homura checked the night before, Nagisa had slept in Mami's bed and Mami on a couch, since the spare sheets and blankets hadn't been washed or aired in far too long. Not since Kyouko had stayed there in friendlier days, but now there was a guest under the roof again and Mami happily set about making her comfortable.

Speaking of Kyouko, in the Miki home she and Sayaka were sulking, apparently after an argument in the wake of Madoka's visit. For Sayaka, this meant throwing on some headphones and staying in her room. For Kyouko, this meant eating three of Sayaka's favorite butterscotch puddings out of the pantry. They would likely butt heads a little more and soon move past it. Homura wasn't worried. They suited each other strangely well.

And at the most important place, the Kaname house, Madoka was with her mother, who had come home drunk after a company social again. They shared the kitchen table, both of them sipping glasses of water at Madoka's insistence, Junko rambling on about work and Madoka smiling as she listened. Tatsuya was asleep, clutching a stuffed bunny with a yellow crescent moon on its head, a loving gift from Madoka's collection. Tomohisa was setting the timer on the rice cooker for the morning, the last thing he would do before heading to bed with his wife. Madoka's life and family were both undisturbed.

"They'll hate me for what I've done to them," Homura murmured to herself, and smiled.

"I'll bear their hate happily."

OoOoO


	3. Chapter 3

.

* * *

OoOoO

 **A Curse Between Us**

 **Chapter 3**

OoOoO

* * *

When Nagisa woke the next morning, she sleepily decided this was no good. The only proper thing to do was burrow back into the blankets. Mami would wake her up when breakfast was ready, that was good enough. Nagisa had a hard night, after all! So, pushing away thoughts about Miss Akemi and her dolls with razor grins, she hugged tight the warmth that was snuggling up against her and slipped back into a doze.

Distant strains of Mami's singing drifted through the apartment, bringing a smile to Nagisa even half awake as she was. Silly Mami. Silly lonely crybaby Mami. But it was going to be okay now, Bebe was here to take care of her. Mami was singing that tune she liked, the one that was all soaring and floaty and big. Maybe Mami could be a singer if she didn't need to be a puella magi? Nagisa rubbed her face into the pillow and the gently squeaking fur and let Mami's sweet, sonorous voice wrap her in peace.

Wait.

Mami was out there singing somewhere. Nagisa was holding someone warm and cuddly.

If Mami wasn't in the guest bedroom, who was she cuddling?

Nagisa slowly pulled her eyes open and looked into a face of blue rings. It looked back at her, floppy plush ears trembling with contained excitement, and leaned in to nuzzle her.

Nagisa shouted and rolled back. This didn't work very well for two reasons. First, she was still holding her little surprised friend. Second, she was in a bed. She fell out of bed and hit the floor, bringing the interloper with her to bounce off her face and go scrambling away with a clamor of indignant squeaks. The mouse-like creature ran panicking around the room in circles, red-polka dot body on spindly little feet.

"Pyotr, you can't be out here! How would I tell Mami about you?" Nagisa stood up, fell on her face, tugged off the blankets tangled around her legs, stood up again, and chased her familiar around the thankfully spacious guest room. "I didn't ask her if I can have a pet!"

Pyotr spun around and growled at her before darting away again.

"No! Explaining familiars is even harder!" With a dive, Nagisa managed to snatch up Pyotr and trap it in a hug, landing near the door. She sighed with relief. Then she realized Mami's singing was coming closer, and both she and Pyotr froze.

"Pyotr, you have to go back, right now! Mami's coming!"

Pyotr looked at the door, as though realizing there was something important about what was on the other side of it… and then started scrambling to paw and snuffle at the door crack.

"No, I'm not letting you out!" Pyotr squeaked a complaint at her. "I already know there's cheese in Mami's kitchen, you don't need to find it for me! Hurry up and leave before she sees you!"

Mami's singing cut off, probably because she was almost to the guest room. Nagisa took a deep breath and grabbed her familiar with her powers. With a mournful whine, Pyotr slipped back inside Nagisa's soul and disappeared just in time.

"Bad Pyotr," Nagisa muttered.

"Good morning, Nagisa!" Mami called through the door, knocking. "Are you up and decent?"

"Yes, Mami!" Wait, no, she should say no! To the decent part at least, Mami wouldn't believe her if she said she wasn't awake.

The door swung open, then stopped abruptly right in front of her face. Mami, eyebrows rising, looked at Nagisa lying on the ground in front of the door.

"I fell out of bed," Nagisa admitted.

Mami raised her head to look at the bed, a little over ten feet away from Nagisa. All the sheets lay in a jumbled heap halfway between them.

"I fell really far." Nagisa scrambled up and started trying to pull the bedsheets back into some sort of order.

"I see," Mami said, though she clearly didn't. "Anyway, I'm starting breakfast. Is there anything you'd like?"

"Cheese please!"

"Somehow, I think I expected that? You can't have it at every meal, you know…"

"Pleeeease?"

"Hmm, I suppose I could make an omelet. I'll tell you when breakfast is ready."

Nagisa finished forcing the bed into a state that was… not made, exactly, but at least no one would look at the mess and suspect she'd just played tackle-tag with an unruly piece of her soul. "Thank you!"

OoOoO

The main feature of breakfast was an omelet filled with diced red pepper, onion, and a gooey core of spicy melted pepper jack cheese. Nagisa happily devoured hers with gusto and a smear of ketchup. After breakfast, Mami cleared away the dishes and asked Nagisa to stay at the table. It was time to get down to business.

"Firstly, I'm sorry we haven't been able to get to this sooner," Mami began. "School takes up enough of the daylight hours, and I'd rather not take a new puella magi out on a nighttime patrol until I've had time to properly train you a little, so… Well, we have the weekend now, best to take full advantage, right?"

"Right! I don't mind waiting a little, staying at your house is fun!"

Mami looked troubled. "I still can't believe… ah, never mind me. Right then! To start then, how much did Kyubey tell you when you contracted?"

"Um… get a wish and fight wraiths?"

"You're supposed to know more than that," Mami said, a tight frown on her usually gracious face.

"Sorry…"

"Oh, don't worry, you haven't done anything wrong!" Mami smoothed her face over and smiled brightly, trying not to make her guest uneasy. "I meant that Kyubey's supposed to tell you more than that unless there's a real emergency right when he finds you. Let's start from the beginning, then."

OoOoO

Mami launched into an explanation of the basics of the life of puella magi, stopping occasionally to quiz Nagisa and make sure it was sinking in properly. Wraiths spawn from the negative emotions of humans like fear, anger, hate, loneliness, and guilt. Incubators give girls a wish and unlock their magical potential. The new puella magi use their powers to hunt the wraiths for grief cubes, which the Incubators then harvest for energy.

Even though her career as a puella magi in the first world had been measured in minutes, Nagisa knew all this by watching from within the Law of Cycles after Madoka came for her. She still didn't have any problem paying attention though, because she was so shocked at how many secrets Mami knew.

Mami also knew and went on to explain the full importance of soul gems, and that the gem was actually and truly the seat of the soul. The body was boosted for combat and almost expendable in part or whole so long as it meant protecting the gem. She explained that the dark corruption in gems was grief, which came from using their powers and from negative emotions, and that allowing grief to accumulate was dangerous. A very full gem meant a very corrupted soul, and ruined a girl's ability to feel well or think clearly. She explained grief spirals, in which very strong despair could rapidly fill a gem and how important it was to clean the gem immediately and get help from a friend.

Mami had said Kyubey was supposed to tell girls quite a lot when they contracted, but… all this? It never told anyone this much in the other worlds unless they dug hard.

And then, Mami said something that made Nagisa jump forward so hard she fell out of her chair.

"Wait!" Nagisa pulled herself back up. "Say that again!"

"You can keep your soul gem clean by using grief cubes or by waiting for the grief to drain," Mami said again. "This is very important, and I'll show you how to do it later."

"W-what do you mean drain?"

"Hmm, well noticed. If you leave it alone, the amount of grief in your gem slowly goes down over time. You can even skip using grief cubes after a battle and your gem will eventually clean itself. But I wouldn't advise it unless you really need to stockpile cubes," Mami warned.

"But, but, when did that happen?"

Mami blinked and raised her eyebrows in confusion. "What do you mean? That's just how soul gems work."

Not in any world Nagisa was familiar with. But she hushed herself and let Mami go on.

"This makes it easier to stockpile cubes if you're running low. You can also use simple powers casually without needing to hunt more, and you don't need to worry about hunting if there aren't any wraiths in your area."

"But there are limits to your gem's ability to clean itself, so you mustn't rely on it too much!" Mami started ticking items off on her fingers. "First, wraiths are often drawn to puella magi, so you still need to know how to fight even if you don't want to hunt. That's why I thought it best that you stay here with me for protection until you had some proper training. Second, because wraiths can be drawn to magical girls, it's best to keep your gem as clean as you can afford anyway, since you never know when you'll need to use your magic. Third, the gem doesn't clean itself quickly enough to outpace a grief spiral or using a great deal of magic. Did you get all that?"

"Uh-huh!"

Mami quizzed Nagisa a bit more to make sure it stuck, then prepared to go on. Her usual patient and kind face looked a little worn as she readied herself. "Next…" Mami bit her lip. "I'm sorry, Nagisa, but this next bit is rather scary."

Nagisa puffed up her cheeks and glared. "More scary or less scary than fighting giant bald men with glowy laser hands who try to kill you?"

Mami looked chagrined, remembering what kind of life they shared now. "Well, maybe it's more sad than scary, when you put it that way. You need to know what happens if your soul gem is destroyed or fills up entirely with grief, and why it's so important to keep it clean."

Oh. _Oh._ This… this _was_ important. Important because going crazy and dying was really really bad, she knew that firsthand, but also because this might tell her something about what happened to Madoka without having to ask H…Miss Akemi. Nagisa paid rapt attention.

Mami shifted her own soul gem from ring to egg and set it on the table between them. Its golden light tinged the color of the room around them, brighter somehow than both the artificial lights above and the sunlight coming in the windows. Mami steeled herself, looking crushed at having to be the one to tell a child this. "When a puella magi's gem is destroyed or fully corrupted, the girl dies and is taken away by a force we call the Law of Cycles."

"Taken away?" Nagisa didn't let herself look scared, though. It had already happened to her once, and she had to be brave for Mami anyway.

Mami nodded. "First, the gem drains of all corruption, and the gem or its pieces vanish. Then the girl herself vanishes too."

No witches. That was good. Miss Akemi did… something to Madoka, but if girls were being cleansed and taken then the Law of Cycles was maybe still working right? A little?

"You need to know the risks and I can see you're being very brave, but it's okay if that's too big to wrap your head around right now," Mami said, reaching over her soul gem to take Nagisa's hand. "The lives of puella magi are very dangerous and often very lonely, and you likely didn't know that when you wished. It might not even be sinking in now. But it can be okay, and we do important work. If a puella magi can manage to find some friends to watch her back and just take life one day at a time…" A tremor came into Mami's voice, and she blinked away a few tears.

That was no good. Happy thoughts! "Tell me more about the Law of Cycles?" Nagisa asked. Well, happ _ier_ thoughts, anyway.

Mami composed herself. "What do you want to know?"

Nagisa thought. "Mmm… has anyone ever seen it?"

"Not so far as I know," Mami shook her head. "It comes to us when we have been pushed past our limit and can do nothing else by our own power except despair. The girls whom it comes to save might see it, but we can't ask them."

"Does it hurt?"

"I don't think so. All the girls I've seen or heard about look like they're falling into a deep sleep when it takes them."A deep sleep? That didn't sound right. It should be… relief. Light. Happy, like coming home. Mami went on. "Doesn't that sound nice? Like a good rest after a long day." There was something far away and mournful in Mami's voice, like she needed a vacation.

Nagisa didn't know if silly crybaby Mami was mostly sad for herself or for the young soldier sitting across from her, but she didn't like it. She got up, marched around the table, fixed crybaby Mami with a stern pout, and threw her arms around Mami as tight as she could. After a moment of surprise, Mami hugged back just as fiercely.

They'd first met in what for Nagisa was a nightmare, a haze of hunger and fear and madness and teeth before Madoka came for her. They met again in a different nightmare, one dreamt by Miss Akemi, and as Bebe she'd come to see how sweet and loving and lonely Mami could be. Whatever else happened in this new daydream of Miss Akemi's, she wasn't going to leave Mami alone.

"I'm not tired," Nagisa insisted.

Mami laughed, short and clear like chimes. "Me neither," she promised.

"I want to stay with you," Nagisa declared.

"Really? I mean, ah, well, there are certainly many advantages to puella magi staying together." She was surprised and pleased and trying to hold herself back. "Working together as a group is always safer, you don't have to keep secrets from family this way, and… and I would love to have you, Nagisa, really! But it wouldn't be right to take you away from your family."

"It's okay!"

Mami stiffened a little Nagisa's arms, then slowly pushed her back and peered at her. "…Nagisa. You didn't actually get permission from your parents to stay with a friend for a few days, did you?"

"Um…" In this world, they met at a market when Mami saved her from her own inability to carry a large enough stack of cheese blocks without dropping them everywhere. Mami realized Nagisa was a young puella magi, easily convinced her to come visit, and then Nagisa… just sort of went roof-hopping until school was out and it was time to show up at Mami's

 _'_ _Currently, Momoe Nagisa is living with her aunt and uncle, not her parents,'_ Kyubey sent as he walked along the kitchen counter, weaving through the appliances. _'_ _I took the liberty of clouding their minds so Nagisa would not be missed while the two of you addressed puella magi business.'_

Nagisa jumped a foot in the air and spun to face Kyubey. But by the time she landed, she realized something that almost completely distracted her from Kyubey sneaking up on them:

She already knew she was living with her aunt and uncle. The memory of it was there, color washed out like an old recording, somehow separate from her other memories like it was inside its own bubble. But she somehow knew that after her mother died, she went to live with her aunt and uncle.

But Nagisa also remembered, in the memories that were really hers, that she hadn't lived long enough after contracting for that to happen.

Mami, too, was more irate than pleased to see the Incubator in her kitchen, and fixed it with a firm disapproving look. "Kyubey, may I ask what you were thinking contracting a girl her age?"

 _'_ _Momoe Nagisa contracted under circumstances now considered very unusual.'_

"Circumstances which were…"

 _'_ _Not mine to discuss.'_

Mami looked at Nagisa, prompting her. But no, oh no. Miss Akemi would kill her if she went around telling about the old world! Maybe for real, even. Nagisa refused to meet Mami's eye and shook her head. Mami sighed. "Did she at least get a good wish?" Mami asked Kyubey.

Nagisa felt her face going red.

 _'_ _I thought you puella magi generally hold that wishes are private and shouldn't be disclosed casually?'_

"I'm not asking specifics, I'd just like to know if her compensation for becoming puella magi was at least worthwhile."

 _'_ _I'm not sure what you mean by a 'good' wish. Momoe Nagisa has a great deal of power compared to the average puella magi. If you have criteria other than that in mind, you'll either have to be more explicit or ask Momoe Nagisa herself.'_

Mami looked to Nagisa, who was beet-red and standing in front of Mami with her hands contritely behind her back. "You don't need to say if you'd rather not…"

Nagisa jumped forward and burrowed her face in Mami's neck. Then, in a small voice, she said, "I wished for a cake."

"Kyubey!"

 _'_ _Yes?'_

Mami hugged Nagisa to her as she shouted at the Incubator. "Not only did you let a girl her age contract, but you let her wish for a _cake_?"

 _'_ _We Incubators, as the ones working the process to unlock a girl's power, cannot advise on choosing wishes. A girl's wish must come from her own heart; otherwise, our interference weakens the power of their resulting magic.'_

A very, very small voice struggled up from the bundle of shame that Mami was holding. "…it was a cheesecake…"

Mami took a deep breath. "Nagisa, I should tell you about Kyubey as well. He's something of a helper for puella magi. But, compared to how normal people think and what they call important, he… well…" She struggled for words to explain to a ten year old the difference between people and Incubators. "…Just be absolutely certain that if Kyubey suggests something or thinks a plan is a good idea, you come talk to me about it first before doing anything, okay?"

Nagisa didn't see what was so hard about it. All she had to say was that Kyubey was cold and mean and didn't care about them at all, no matter what it promised. But she nodded anyway.

"Now then, we should talk about your parents… sorry, I mean your aunt and uncle, a little before we decide where you'll be staying."

Nagisa pulled back and gave Mami her best puppydog eyes. "I never met them even once until Mama was already sick for a long time." Mami wavered, and Nagisa delivered the finishing blow. "I don't think they wanted me after Mama went to heaven."

Mami looked crushed. "And you'd really rather stay with me?" Nagisa nodded as hard as she could. "Well, it is better for puella magi to stick together," Mami admitted, clearly liking the idea.

 _'_ _If that's decided, then I'll tweak records and memories to arrange it. The record will show that following the death of her mother, Momoe Nagisa's aunt and uncle declined to adopt her and she was placed in foster care. She is currently placed long-term with Tomoe Mami. Naturally, you won't have to worry about government employees checking up on her status or noticing that Tomoe Mami is too young to foster a child.'_

"If you would then, Kyubey," Mami said.

Nagisa reached out with her mind, brushing against Kyubey's. _'_ _Why are you helping so much?'_

Kyubey replied to her privately. _'_ _As Tomoe Mami said, one of my roles in this world is to support puella magi in a non-combat capacity.'_ Nagisa glared, letting Kyubey know she didn't believe that for a second. _'_ _Also, Akemi Homura finds it agreeable that you should stay with Tomoe Mami and instructed me to assist.'_

…and now Nagisa wasn't sure what to think about this. As long as she was staying with Mami, Miss Akemi knew right where she was! But… but she knew where she was anyway, didn't she? Nagisa poked at the world with her witch-sense, and found sure enough that Okubyou was still… somewhere around here, watching her. So why did Miss Akemi want her here, then?

Mami stood up, careful to avoid pushing over Nagisa, who was still clinging to her. "Well, if you're staying here permanently, then let's get you settled in properly!" She was happy, happier than Nagisa had seen her since arriving in this new world.

She could figure out what Miss Akemi was up to later. She was staying with Mami, no matter what.

OoOoO

Nagisa sat in the swing at the park, feet pushing around the woodchips beneath her. Mami had promised to take her patrolling this evening, but right now she was out running boring errands and buying things that Nagisa would need to live with her. There was a game console in Mami's apartment she told Nagisa she could play, but she didn't want to stay there alone with Kyubey stalking around on the kitchen counter. So, the park.

A cool breeze came through, ruffling the grass and pushing puffy clouds along. She thought about running along the grassy fields or bringing out some Pyotrs and pushing them on the spinny thing like Mama used to do for her, but didn't feel like it. There were things she couldn't get out of her head.

A cake. A cheesecake to share with her Mama, who was sick in the hospital. That's what her wish had been. And almost right afterward while she was holding the cake in her hands and ready to go into Mama's room, Kyubey asked her one little question without changing the fake smile on its face even one little bit.

 _'Why didn't you wish to cure your mother's cancer instead?'_

Because she never imagined she could. As soon as she realized what she'd missed, Nagisa lost herself, and stayed lost until Madoka came for her.

Except, now she had another set of memories, washed-out memories set apart from the others and kept in a bubble. Memories of what happened _after_ that. She didn't become a witch, because there were no witches. Her aunt and uncle came and took her after Mama died. She remembered meeting her aunt and uncle once toward the end—her _real_ memories, the ones of her first life. But now she had gray bubble memories of living with them after Mama died.

She lied when she told Mami she didn't think her aunt and uncle wanted her. Mami was lonely, but not enough to take a her from a loving home, puella magi or not, so all she had to do was let Mami think she shouldn't be with them. Her uncle laughed with a deep rumble and had neat hair white just like hers and Mama's, and her aunt made her lots of cookies but didn't let her eat enough cheese. They went places like the beach and the movies, and she would probably have a lot of fun living with them. That's what the memory bubble told her, anyway.

But they weren't Mama. Even more, they weren't Mami with golden eyes and hair and a warm, sad smile.

While Mami was putting together a list of all the things she'd need to buy for Nagisa, she asked Kyubey about school. Kyubey mentioned that Nagisa was still enrolled at a local elementary. There had been an argument, with much whining, most of it Nagisa's—well, all of it Nagisa's—about whether magical girl heroes still had to go to school or not. Mami was adamant. "You have to go to school so you can get a fun job when you grow up," she insisted.

Grow up. Puella magi didn't last long enough to grow up. Nagisa already died and went to heaven with Madoka, and lived there… a long time. Nagisa was bad at keeping track of time, but there in the Law of Cycles hours and days and months just didn't seem to matter. How long had she been there? If she was going to grow up, maybe she should have already.

Would she? When she found herself in this new world Miss Akemi created after capturing Madoka, she was overwhelmed with the feeling of being _alive_ again. It was different than living outside time in the Law of Cycles or in the dream of Miss Akemi's labyrinth when she was a witch. This was a real world, and here she was living in it. It felt so miraculous that at first she thought Madoka must have outlasted whatever Miss Akemi tried to do to her and made a new world, because something this wonderful could only come from Madoka. Then, when she realized it wasn't Madoka's world, it was Miss Akemi's….

She died once, and now this new world was trying to give her a new life, with an aunt and uncle to replace the Mama she lost. Did Miss Akemi do that?

Nagisa clutched her head and whimpered. "Mou, all this is making my head hurt."

She sat there, head in her hands and feet scuffing woodchips, until the feeling of witchiness pinged her mind. She looked up, and Okubyou stood before her bowing.

"Good-for-nothing wants to talk to you," Okubyou said.

Nagisa slipped off the swing and followed.

She could maybe live a new life here in this world, if she wanted. But it had already been a long time since she lost her old one. When she tried to remember Mama's face, the first thing that came to mind wasn't Mama's, or the washed-out gray of her aunt and uncle she barely knew, or even Mami's elegant lonely smile. It was a girl in a flowing white dress with long pink hair, her eyes glowing golden with power, her smile radiant with mercy, and her arms outstretched. It was Madoka.

OoOoO

Okubyou didn't lead led her toward Miss Akemi's apartment like Nagisa expected. Instead, after some roof jumping, they entered the well-to-do neighborhoods that had forests and fields and hills. Miss Akemi stood waiting on a sidewalk underneath the shadow of a copse of trees. She motioned Nagisa to follow as they got closer, and Okubyou disappeared back to wherever.

They walked, Miss Akemi looking ahead and Nagisa at her side trying to look small and inoffensive. It wasn't very hard. "She saved you," Miss Akemi said after a moment, without preamble.

Not that any was needed. "She did," Nagisa agreed.

"Do you love her?"

"Of course I do! She _saved_ me!" Nagisa said. "You know what it's like to be a witch! She saved me from that. She's kind and gentle and wise, and she gave us a place we could rest from our nightmares. She… she took care of us." A home, within the Law of Cycles. It wasn't the same as being alive, but there was… light and love and relief, like a dream outside the world they suffered in, but more than a dream, because they weren't asleep, and they wouldn't wake up from it.

"I thought so," Miss Akemi said distantly. "I imagine when Madoka announced she was going to bring home a dear friend and needed help, you were one of the first to step forward. Your loyalty to Madoka must have been beautiful indeed for you to be chosen to stand equal with Sayaka, her friend and knight, when it came time to rescue me from the Incubators."

She remembered it. Not everyone in the Law of Cycles looked into the outside world. Fewer would or even could look into times and places that didn't concern their lives and their friends, and hardly any really understood who Akemi Homura was, or _why_ the weary girl fighting in Madoka's name was so important to their goddess. But even if they didn't know why, they could all feel Madoka's pleasure as she prepared to reclaim her.

And Nagisa, who looked into the world and saw that Miss Akemi had been the one to end Charlotte's nightmare in a time before Madoka's ascent, had indeed been first among those who stood up and volunteered to go into Homulilly's labyrinth at Madoka's side and deceive the Incubators.

Until it all went wrong.

"We were ready to welcome you home," Nagisa said, pleading. "She had a place ready for you! You would have been the very first at her side. If you let her go, I'm sure Madoka can still take you to the Law of Cycles!"

If Miss Akemi was moved at all, she didn't show it. She turned her head only far enough to look at Nagisa out the side of her eye. "I have work to do," she replied.

As she said that, they past the copse of trees, and the space on the other side of the sidewalk opened up. Nagisa knew where they were now. A large, modern house sat in the middle of green hills, its windows sparkling with the sun's reflection. There was a shallow pool ringed by bushes on the lawn, the sort you could go wading in even though you probably weren't supposed to. The little boy happily stomping up waves and splashing water didn't seem to care though, nor did Madoka, who walked along the pool's edge holding her little brother's hands.

Madoka spotted them, and waved. "Homura! Come over here!"

Miss Akemi waved back, and they crossed the lawn. Madoka's brother stopped his splashing and grinned at them, pointing at Miss Akemi. "Kitty!"

"And this is Tatsuya!" Madoka lifted her squealing brother up in the air to present him. "Oof, you're getting heavy. This is Homura. Say hello, Tatsuya!"

"Kitty! Kitty!" He reached out, trying to grab at Miss Akemi's long dark hair.

"I'm pleased to meet you, Tatsuya," Miss Akemi replied with an air of dignity, and stuck a few fingers out for Tatsuya to grab and shake around.

"He calls everything he likes 'kitty' until he can learn how to say its name properly," Madoka explained with a grin as she set her brother back in the pool. "Down you go, silly boy."

"I'm glad I have his approval." Miss Akemi nodded to Nagisa, waiting patiently at her side with arms shyly behind her back. "This is Momoe Nagisa, another puella magi in our city."

That surprised Madoka. She looked Nagisa over, taking in how young she was. "You must be very brave to fight," Madoka told her, respect and something like awe in her voice.

This was why Nagisa liked Madoka. One reason, anyway. Madoka didn't doubt any of her puella magi, didn't tell them they couldn't do it because they were too young or too scared. She believed in them and hoped, and stepped in to make up the difference if they stumbled.

"Um, I have a present for you," Nagisa said. With her hands still behind her back, she shook her labyrinth and caught the pair of lollipops that tumbled out. Miss Akemi quirked a tiny smile at that. Nagisa held one out for Madoka and one for Tatsuya. "Here!"

"Oh! Thank you." Madoka took it. "Caramel apple."

Tatsuya took his cherry tootsie pop and stared at Nagisa, the treat-giver, with wide-eyed reverence. "Gadapilah!"

"Can you say 'thank you,' Tatsuya?"

"Thang Gadapilah!"

"You're welcome," Nagisa said, and patted his head. Giving Madoka candy had become a little habit of hers inside the Law of Cycles. She was the witch of sweets after all, why not get some use out of it?

"Do you two want to come inside?" Madoka asked Miss Akemi. "I can get you something to drink if you're hot, and you can meet my family. Mama's actually here all day since it's the weekend."

"I'd love to, but we can't stay, unfortunately. Another time?"

"Oh. Of course!" Madoka smiled, but was clearly disappointed.

"We should be off, then." Miss Akemi stepped closer for a moment and squeezed Madoka's hands. "I'll wait til I see you again, Madoka."

"Y-yeah." Madoka blushed as she squeezed back, looking much happier.

Nagisa looked away. It felt too private to watch. No, worse, it felt _wrong_. Miss Akemi was lying to Madoka! Or, tricking her or hiding secrets from her or _something_ bad. Madoka really cared about Miss Akemi, Nagisa knew that, but if Madoka remembered what Miss Akemi had done to her, she wouldn't be standing there happy and holding her hands. She'd be mad!

Wouldn't she?

They said their last goodbyes and left Madoka to continue playing with Tatsuya. Madoka, her brother, and her house vanished around the corner as they walked back into the shadows of trees.

"Can you guess why I showed you that?" Miss Akemi asked.

Nagisa shook her head.

"I was harsh last night when I tried to tell you this, and I apologize for that. But did she ever talk about her life before her wish? About her little brother, about her mother and father, about her hopes and dreams?"

"No." Nagisa shook her head again. "Maybe with Sayaka? But no one else."

"I'm not surprised. Why would she speak about peaceful innocent days? She threw them away to save us, why would she reminisce with us about the cost? She threw her life away to bear our burdens. If I must do her work in her place to give Madoka her life back, then I shall." Quiet anger simmered in Miss Akemi's voice as she talked. "You saw her. You saw how happy she is now, didn't you?"

"I did," Nagisa admitted. But Madoka smiled in the Law of Cycles, too. Different, sadder, wiser, not like the bright innocent glee as she watched Tatsuya splash about, but being among the girls she'd saved always made Madoka smile.

"I don't expect you to love me like you love her. But I _will_ expect you to help me do her work and protect her world." A hint of steel. "Will you do this for me?"

Miss Akemi was being… almost nice right now, bringing her to see Madoka like this. Certainly in comparison to last night. But Nagisa couldn't forget last night either, couldn't forget the way Miss Akemi had threatened to rip out her memories and tear Charlotte away. Miss Akemi might be asking now, but she wasn't really asking.

Nagisa hesitated, wringing her hands behind her back, unable to meet Homura's eye. Still, she couldn't keep a tiny bit of defiance out of her answer. "If… if it's really work Madoka would want."

Miss Akemi watched her for a moment. "Acceptable, for now. Follow me back to my apartment. There's one more thing to talk about now, and I have a task for you. It's time to talk about the Great Curse."

OoOoO

After a short bit of roof jumping, they arrived back at Miss Akemi's home. She led the way into a room dimly lit by a host of candelabras mounted or floating along the walls. In the center of the room, there was a ring of dark elegant-looking couches and chairs. They had curving backs edged with carved wood. A giant mass of insane, rattling clockwork chattered from the ceiling, and from it a scythed pendulum swung ponderously back and forth as though deciding where to strike.

The floating screens along the wall drew most of Nagisa's attention, though. Dozens of overlapping pictures floated freely. Some showed views of Mitakihara, city streets or homes or parks, always with tin soldiers or crows or Clara dolls somewhere in the scene. Others had pictures of scrawled cursive writing in languages Nagisa couldn't read against faded crumbling paper. Wraiths and witches and familiars leered at her from still frames. Pictures of Madoka, Sayaka, Kyouko, and Mami were scattered here and there, always tucked just behind some other picture as though Miss Akemi was ashamed to have them. In the center of the display as if placed in honor was a dark screen with white text, written in witch runes:

 _"_ _I sung of Chaos and Eternal Night,_

 _Taught by the heav'nly Muse to venture down_

 _The dark descent, and up to reascend,_

 _Though hard and rare: thee I revisit safe,_

 _And feel thy sovran vital Lamp;"_

"Welcome to the war room." Miss Akemi's mouth twisted sourly as she said it. She lay down on one of the couches on the inner ring, melting into its curved back. A clear crystal goblet of some purple liquid waited near her on a table in the center. Nagisa hesitated, then perched on a couch across from her, finding it surprisingly plush. "You've felt it, haven't you?" Miss Akemi asked. "The nest of wraiths in Mitakihara?"

Several viewscreens flickered and changed. A satellite image of Mitakihara showed a section of the river running through the city, swaths of it colored in an ominous red. Others showed lines of wraiths traveling along the river shores, a procession of unholy monks on pilgrimage. The largest was a picture taken from some tower near the river. The view of the city on the other shore was completely blocked, for a thick roiling shadow hung over the water.

"I did," Nagisa said. She'd seen it while roof jumping and exploring the city on her first day here before going to Mami's apartment. The pictures showed an enormous expanse of miasma, but the pictures didn't do it justice. It was a yawning abyss of hate and pain, so terrible that Nagisa thought she might be pulled in from even just standing on the shore near the waters and hadn't dared approach. It was a wonder the thing hadn't devoured the city already. She'd felt it pricking at her senses from halfway across the city before she saw it. Even now, sitting across from Miss Akemi in her home and feeling her power pressed into everything around them, Nagisa could still sense the faintest pulse of the wraith nest, permeating the background magic of the city.

"A blight in my world," Miss Akemi muttered. "For years, Walpurgisnacht waited at the end of my road, leading everything to ruin. Now, this monstrosity. Witches and wraiths, both born from the curses within the heart. Perhaps it's simply in human nature to create abominations." Miss Akemi sank further back into the cushions, shadows creeping forward over her face. "We would get bored without something to damn ourselves. Nothing else could explain why catastrophe is a constant."

"Are you really ready to give up on our hearts?" Nagisa asked, a little timidly. "Madoka would want us to keep hoping."

She flinched when Miss Akemi shot her a withering glare. "I've endured as a puella magi for more years than you have lived, and I certainly won't surrender now that I have my prize. Don't presume to lecture me about giving up, however much you think you've seen of Madoka's hope."

Miss Akemi raised herself up on one arm and took a sip of the goblet on the table. She grimaced ever so slightly as the sweet-smelling purple liquid hit her lips, and settled back onto the couch with a rattling sigh and a shudder.

Nagisa eyed the goblet on the table warily, its gently-sloshing liquid catching the shine of candlelight. "What is that?" she asked, half to change the subject so Miss Akemi wouldn't snap at her again and half because it smelled so tasty.

"A reminder." Whatever else it was, Miss Akemi didn't seem inclined to say more. She waved a hand, and several viewscreens slid forward and enlarged. A satellite image colored with the miasma over the river, a line of wraiths traveling along the shore, and the view from the shore of the miasma brooding over the river like some hungry half-seen demon.

"Imagine my consternation when I discovered such an imperfection as this in my world," Miss Akemi went on. "A nest of wraiths so concentrated and dug in that it might as well be from the foundation of the earth. The puella magi of this city call it the Great Curse."

"Why haven't you destroyed it?" Nagisa asked.

"Because I need to know whether this world is spawning catastrophes beyond the ability of puella magi to fight. Of course, I have power far more than sufficient to tear apart any horde of wraiths, however they make themselves a nuisance. But do the rest of you? It would be a fine thing if this world was springing holes only I could mend, rushing here and there keeping it from falling apart. I'd have no time to savor paradise."

Miss Akemi looked away from the screens to glance at Nagisa. "This, of course, is where you come in. If my question is whether puella magi can defeat the catastrophes of this world, then I need a puella magi."

"You want me to fight _that_? Without Madoka or Sayaka to lead?" Nagisa stared in horror at the pictures of the Great Curse. "

"Or you could cower and watch as it slowly devours the world Madoka lives in." Miss Akemi scorned her. "Where has your prized faithfulness gone, I wonder? Madoka would be sad to know her last champion runs so quickly, and I certainly don't have any use for you if you won't do your duty as puella magi."

Madoka would run straight for the Great Curse, wouldn't she? Something like this lurking in the world, pure misery and hatred given form to curse the earth… Madoka would take up her bow and charge. And if Miss Akemi didn't have any use for Nagisa… no, she wouldn't think about that. Better to think about what Madoka would want her to do. Of course Madoka would want her to fight the Great Curse. But still… "I can't fight that alone."

"Nor did I say you must." Miss Akemi waved her hand again, and pictures of Mami, Kyouko, and Sayaka slid out from their hiding places. "We both know Mami will leap at the chance for heroics if you give her half an excuse. If the two of you can't handle it together, point Mami at Kyouko and wait for them to reconcile. And if, after adding Kyouko and Sayaka, the Great Curse is still beyond you…" Miss Akemi shrugged. "It's unfortunate, but I then I'll step in and take care of matters."

Nagisa looked at the image of the Great Curse again. Madoka would want her to fight it. Madoka would want _Miss Akemi_ to fight it, if she really could just blow it up in one hit. But Miss Akemi didn't care about that and Nagisa couldn't make her care.

So it was up to her.

She nodded reluctantly. "I'll do it."

Miss Akemi smiled at her, still lying at ease while Nagisa sat straight-backed and uneasy. One finger trailed along the rim of her drink, tracing a line of liquid that caught the flicker of candlelight.

OoOoO

 _'_ _This one is yours, Nagisa! I'll be ready to step in if you need me.'_

 _'Right!'_

The wraith turned sluggishly toward her as she ran closer. It was even bigger than other wraiths, a little taller than most of the homes in the darkened suburb it was hunting in, but it was also a slow one. Better, it was alone.

The thing opened its mouth and let out its droning groan, shattered face looking at her with sightless hunger. While it sluggishly prepared, Nagisa was already moving to strike. She hefted her trumpet, black and covered in red polka dots. Tiny red and blue wings like Charlotte's antennae came off the top. It was a fanciful, toy-like thing. With a bright, clarion note that pushed high above the wraith's chant, Nagisa sent a stream of shimmering bubbles flowing toward the wraith.

Its hands came up and spread apart, pale light gathering at its fingers. _'It's preparing to fire, move!'_ But she didn't need Mami's warning, Nagisa was already preparing to jump. The wraith's energy beam hit Nagisa's stream of bubbles. An explosion like a white burst in the world ripped out from the point of contact as Nagisa' bubbles broke, but close enough that the wraith staggered back and groaned in pain. The wraith's beam kept going through the explosions and struck the ground, but Nagisa was long gone.

She landed at the wraith's left side. It began turning toward her, already bringing its hands up again. _'Keep moving, you're faster than it is. If you can get one more good hit in, you can finish it off.'_ The wraith's robe was already beginning to tatter at the edges, small bits losing stability and coming off in severed bursts of pixelation just like its face. Nagisa cut to the side, trying to get out of its front arc while still cutting down the distance between them. Her maneuverability would give her the advantage at closer range.

She couldn't get out of the wraith's vision, though. Even though it was slower, it only had to turn in place and she wasn't close enough to simply run circles around it yet. Nagisa skipped over another blast of energy, ignoring Mami's shouted warning in her head, and then changed direction and ran straight at the wraith.

There were other ways to escape the wraith's line of sight, after all.

Nagisa ate the distance between her and her target. Before Mami could react to her suicidal-looking tactic, Nagisa threw up an arm and a cloud of empty candy wrappers burst outward. It was a storm of color and motion, spreading out to block vision and confound her opponent.

The wraith hesitated, hands spread for another blast but unsure where its opponent was. It fired into the still-expanding cloud of wrappers, guessing at random rather than wait. Another clarion call, and a stream of bubbles surged toward it—from above, as Nagisa's leap carried her into a flip straight over the wraith. The towering thing couldn't dodge and didn't have time to charge and re-aim. The bubbles hit, bursting over its head and upper body. The explosions tore the wraith apart, its droning chant cut off as it lost coherence.

Nagisa stuck the landing, arms out like an Olympic gymnast, though one carrying a toy trumpet in one hand. Mami leapt down from her observation perch. "Nagisa! That was reckless! I almost pulled you out with ribbons when I saw you running at it."

"But it completely missed me! It didn't even know where I was!"

Mami pressed a hand to her head. "Yes, but if it had seen you when you jumped out of your cloud, you would've been in the air already. Puella magi have means of controlling our motion mid-air with magic, but it's still much trickier than dodging when you're on the ground. It would have been better to continue cutting around it and hit it from behind, or even just try to overwhelm it with more bubbles than it could counter. It's attack was slow enough that it still took damage even when it exploded your bubbles midair, so a few more blocked shots still would have killed it."

Nagisa puffed her cheeks out. "I beat it, didn't I? And no one ever looks up."

Mami nodded and recomposed herself. "You did, didn't you? I suppose I panicked a little when I saw you charging it, but you still won. You're already thinking quickly on your feet, balancing your offense and defense, and learning to use your powers creatively. You have a natural head for this work." She pat Nagisa's cat-eared hat, smiling warmly. "You did very well in your first solo fight, much better than most new puella magi. Still, always remember that when you have a choice, it's better to beat an opponent without opening your guard, okay? We fight so many wraiths that we can't afford to give every one of them a slim chance at a lucky shot."

"Okay!" Nagisa cheered, and enjoyed the headpats. "Let's go find more wraiths!"

"Perhaps a few more," Mami agreed. "Then I'll go hunt the larger groups on my own."

Twilight had faded into night. Mami was making sure Nagisa got some experience fighting wraiths while the nighttime miasma was still thin and the wraiths were sparse. They'd started by ganking solitary wraiths or very small groups, and Mami was generally impressed with how quickly Nagisa caught on. In fact, the only real difficulty Nagisa had was hiding how much experience she already had from working as a herald for Madoka. Playing novice was hard and boring! She needed to get Mami used to the idea that she could hold her own, and fast.

Nagisa took a moment to look up at the severed half-moon floating above the city, shivering a little. It was _creepy_ , especially because no one else seemed to think it was weird. Not to mention when she stared into the sky at night too long, her magic went… weird. Staticky. Like there was just too much _bright_ everywhere, whatever that meant, clogging her senses. She shook her head and got moving again.

They gathered up the grief cube left by Nagisa's kill, and got back to hunting. They moved out of the suburbs and into the city. Mami marked a slumbering group of five wraiths she'd come back for herself when she didn't have Nagisa with her. Soon, Mami stopped and called to Nagisa while they were ranging over high-rise apartments. "This seems like an interesting one. Can you feel that?" she asked.

Nagisa opened herself up. There was a patch of miasma, slick and flowing, to the… south? Southeast? Or southwest? She thought it was moving, but it was also just plain hard to pin down, slipping from her 'vision' just when she thought she'd fixed down its location. "I… think so. But it's so slippery!"

"Indeed. Every miasma bank and the wraiths within it are a little different. Some wraiths are stronger or weaker, some fly, some remain on the ground, some use their energy beams more or depend on physical attacks. As for miasma banks, they can move about or stay in one place, they can go where there are many people or stay in out-of-the-way abandoned nooks, and some make themselves obvious and try to draw victims in, while others try to be as elusive as possible. It looks like this is one of the latter." Mami spun a pair of magic yellow binoculars out of ribbons and looked over the lines of high-rises and into the streets, trying to catch sight of the miasma. "This will be good practice for hunting with all your senses, magical ones included."

They gave chase, Mami letting Nagisa lead for awhile to practice tracking. They got nowhere. Every time she thought they were close, the miasma's presence would cut off to a trickle and suddenly surge up elsewhere.

"It's cheating!" Nagisa declared. "It shouldn't run away while we're trying to fight it."

"I don't think it's actually moving this fast," Mami said, though a little uncertainly. "I think it's just masking its presence somehow. Here, let me lead now."

Mami's sharper senses and faster reactions seemed to get them a little closer, but still the miasma always ebbed away just when they thought they had it. Mami grew more focused and determined the longer it stayed out of her reach.

Eventually she ordered that they split up. They used telepathy to relay their different impressions of where the miasma was hiding, hoping it wouldn't be able to trick two different puella magi in two different positions at the same time. It seemed to help, and a few times they were sure that one of them was getting a false read and the other was sensing the real miasma bank, but two still weren't enough to trap it.

Mami called a halt and rejoined Nagisa when the hunt led them too close to the river. They still hadn't caught sight of the miasma they were chasing, but Nagisa could make out the thick form of the Great Curse hanging low over the water. She shivered. Sensing the pitch-black hole in the world, gaping wide with hunger, was so much worse than just seeing Miss Akemi's pictures of it. "Mami, what's that?"

"Something you shouldn't go near anytime soon," Mami said firmly. "In fact, I think it's about time we turn back if the miasma we're hunting is going to…. Wait a moment."

Mami cut off and swung her head away from the Great Curse, looking further down the shore to a long bridge stretching over part of the river away from the miasma.

Nagisa stared in the same direction, trying to find what Mami was so interested in. There wasn't much to see in the patches of city light. "What are you looking at? I don't feel any wraiths over there."

"Stay here and keep out of sight," Mami said, then leapt from their tower. She bounded over a few more before taking up position on a tower with a good view over the bridge. With a flourish, she pulled out a rifled musket even longer than her usual guns.

As Mami took aim, Nagisa stopped trying to focus on wraiths and just let her senses open up. And then she felt… something very familiar, a magic presence like the swell of rising water and song. As soon as she recognized it, she shouted, "Mami, _don't!_ "

At the same moment, the crack of gunfire rang out. A single shot tore through the air down toward the bridge, and bounced off something with a metallic ping. A flurry of blue and white slid beneath a streetlight before flitting back into the dark.

Nagisa instinctively tried to leap off the tower to throw herself between them, but a hand clamped down on her shoulder. Okubyou stood behind her. "Good-for-nothing said to keep your distance," she warned, eyes a dim yellow. "Let your owner handle this."

"That was a warning shot, Miki." Mami stood at the edge of the tower, arms crossed. Her voice, magically boosted, echoed louder than her gunfire had. "You're to stay out of my territory. I believe we've had this discussion before."

On the bridge, Sayaka had an enormous broad two-handed sword before her, flat side turned forward where it caught Mami's shot. She held herself in a crouch ready for violence, but said nothing.

Mami went on. "Fortunately for you, I'm willing to let you off easy tonight if you turn around now. We've already proven you can't fight me at my level."

Nagisa held her breath. She didn't know what was going on or why Sayaka and Mami were ready to fight, but she wouldn't let them. Even if Okubyou was going to tell Miss Akemi, she couldn't let them fight. She reached out to Sayaka with her mind. _'Please don't fight her here!'_

Sayaka's head snapped up toward her tower. She must've figured out where the third puella magi was when she heard her shout at Mami. Okubyou grabbed Nagisa and dragged her backwards out of sight; Nagisa didn't resist. _'Who are you?'_ Sayaka demanded. _'I've heard your voice before.'_

 _'I'm no one! I'm just a new puella magi! Please don't fight Mami!'_

"Well?" Mami demanded. "How long do you intend to drag this out, Miki? I'm losing patience."

Sayaka shot one last glance up at Nagisa's tower, then dispelled her sword. "I'll withdraw for now, Tomoe. Give my regards to your new trainee." She turned and leapt from the bridge, a blue platform forming beneath her feet from glowing musical staffs and launching her away.

"She's suspicious of you now," Okubyou hissed at Nagisa.

"She was already going to be suspicious when she recognized my voice!" Nagisa protested. "I already talked to her once before Miss Akemi told me not to, remember? And I couldn't let them fight! Miss Akemi even said I might have to get Mami to join the others, didn't she?"

Okubyou's eyes flashed rings of yellow and red, before she vanished again.

Mami landed on Nagisa's tower, looking grim. "I'm sorry we had to deal with this on your first patrol. And I'd be much happier if that girl didn't even know you're working with me now."

"Mami..." She remembered these girls working alongside each other, and living and playing together when there was no work and no wraiths to fight. Was that really nothing more than Homulilly's dream? She couldn't believe that, didn't want to. But she also couldn't figure out how to tell Mami how _wrong_ it was to see her and Sayaka at odds. "...what was that?"

"That…" Mami sighed. "You'd expect puella magi would be natural allies against wraiths, but that isn't always the case. That girl in particular, Miki Sayaka, is far too reckless. She works alone and won't listen to anything I've tried to tell her about being puella magi. She absolutely hates Kyubey and won't let him anywhere near her. She won't even say why. With how much she distrusts him, I don't even know how she managed to contract in the first place. She's fixated on the Great Curse as well and keeps trying to sneak through my territory to reach it."

"Is that really reason to fight her, though?"

"I knew this wouldn't sound good," Mami muttered to herself. "Believe me when I say that the Great Curse is not to be trifled with. I used to have a partner named Sakura Kyouko. She and I used to make brief runs into the Great Curse to cut down the wraith numbers. We managed to keep them somewhat under control, but that was the best we could ever manage. Staying any longer or trying to reach the center of the miasma would have gotten us killed for certain. Now that Kyouko is out on her own, the most I can do is try to stop the Great Curse from expanding further by catching the wraiths that break off from the main body and come ashore. I've tried to explain this to Miki, but she won't listen. I finally had to just throw her out of my territory by force. Otherwise, she'll do something foolish around the Great Curse and get herself killed."

"But we're supposed to fight wraiths. We shouldn't stop Sayaka from trying either."

Mami leaned forward and held both Nagisa's shoulders, and spoke kindly but firmly. "Nagisa, listen very carefully. We fight wraiths and we do the best we can to save as many people as we can, but charging into the Great Curse alone head on like Miki tries to isn't fighting wraiths. It's suicide. The only reason Mitakihara still stands is because the Great Curse stays quiet over the river instead of roaming over the city like the one we were hunting earlier. If all the wraiths inside it were to rampage, the city would be destroyed overnight. None of us can fight that alone. It's so bad that Mitakihara doesn't let ships travel the river at night, even if they don't actually understand why it's so dangerous." Mami stooped down a little more to catch Nagisa's sulky eye. "Hey. Promise me, as my cute little trainee, that you won't try to go in there, okay? It's good that you want to help, but this isn't something you can handle yet."

"If you can't fight it alone," Nagisa said, pouting, "Then you should go get Kyouko and Sayaka and beat it up all together."

"I would certainly love to," Mami said, "But I can't work with someone like Miki if she won't listen to a word I say, and Kyouko and I…" Mami's smile couldn't fool Nagisa. Mami was still hurting. "I suppose I'd say Kyouko and I weren't on friendly terms when we went our ways.."

What was that about? Nagisa spotted a picture of a younger Kyouko in Mami's apartment, but had been surprised there wasn't more evidence of her. She didn't remember any fight when she was watching them as Bebe inside Miss Akemi's Homulilly labyrinth. Was this something else that Homulilly dreamed away? She hadn't ever looked into Mami and Kyouko's past when she was within the Law of Cycles, either. Was this what Miss Akemi meant when she should point Mami at Kyouko and wait for them to get back together? She'd have to find out more later.

"Well then I'll get really really strong," Nagisa declared, "So we can go run around inside the Great Curse just like you and Kyouko used to! How's that?"

Mami laughed. "You're not going to let this go, are you?"

Nagisa shook her head defiantly.

"Very well then, when I think you're ready, you and I can start raiding the Great Curse to control its wraith population. But only if you promise to not try it alone until then, okay?"

"Okay!" Nagisa spun around and ran along the roof. "Let's go back to hunting!"

Mami looked back up to the sky. "It might be time you go back home, Nagisa. I don't expect Miki to come back tonight, but the miasma will get thick and the wraiths more active as we get closer to midnight. I'll keep on this one's tail and hunt a few more hours, then be home."

"Wait! Can I try one more thing? The miasma wandered away from the Great Curse again." As far as she could tell, anyway. It felt like it wandered back to the north while they were busy... or northeast... or northwest, or maybe just west...

"Hmm, I suppose one more try would be alright. It's off to bed afterward, though."

Nagisa gave her a quick hug. "Thank you, Mami!"

OoOoO

They split up, preparing to hunt the miasma from multiple directions again. The followed it to the north and east awhile until they were mostly sure it was nearby. Nagisa took a deep breath.

It should be safe. Mami hadn't felt anything odd about it this morning, after all. Maybe normal puella magi in this world couldn't feel witches and familiars, since there weren't supposed to be any? Or maybe a herald's familiars were just too different from regular ones. Nagisa opened up her soul, and a gaggle of Pyotrs tumbled out. If Miss Akemi could have hers running around, why couldn't she?

"Hello everyone," she said, kneeling as her mouse-like familiars scrambled over each other to right themselves and ran over to sniff at her hands, jump in her lap, or dash around her in circles. "We have a very important job to do, okay? We're chasing miasma. It's not cheese, but do your best."

At her word, the Pyotrs dashed off into the night on their spindly legs, splitting up and spreading out. She could feel them as they eagerly ran through the streets, she could see the city through their eyes. She pulled up more Pyotrs from her labyrinth and sent them out as well, nudging them about and forming a net. As she focused on each one in turn, she could feel the miasma from their point of view as it tried to slip this way or that.

 _'What are you doing?'_ Mami asked, curious but not alarmed. _'I can feel your magic spreading over the entire district.'_

 _'Um…'_ Oops. It looked like Mami could feel them after all? But they just felt like Nagisa and not like witches? That was probably okay then. _'I think I have some sort of search magic?'_

 _'Hmm, that could be useful. Sharper tracking is always better.'_

Pyotrs dashed through the streets and parking lots. They left the dense downtown behind and veered into an industrial district. The miasma threw up more reflections of its presence, but it couldn't fool all of her eyes, and Nagisa had enough paws on the ground to check all of them anyway. A thrill of success went through one of the Pyotrs; through its eyes, Nagisa finally saw the bank of miasma, dark mists pooling in the yard of a shipping train station surrounded by factories. Other Pyotrs rushed to the site.

 _'Mami, I found it! It's in a train yard west of me.'_

 _'I know where that is. Meet me there, quickly.'_

She got there fast, stopping only to pick up the Pyotrs that were on the way and put them back in her labyrinth. Mami was waiting for her at the edge of the miasma when she touched down in the train yard. The miasma seemed awfully small for something so annoying. It barely covered half the yard. She'd seen larger from some of the three-wraith miasmas she and Mami hit together earlier, and the five-wraith miasma that Mami spotted was almost a whole city block.

Still, the way the currents of mist churned angrily over each other worried her.

"Let's finish this one quickly," Mami said, rifle already raised. "I'll go in first. Follow when I tell you." The mists curled around Mami as she entered, hiding her from view.

Nagisa frantically flapped her hands at the train yard around her. "Hurry!" she whispered as loudly as she could. "Get back over here, I can't leave you lying around!" A small horde of all the remaining Pyotrs bumbled out from hiding, chattering as they dashed over to Nagisa and jumped back in her soul.

Nagisa felt Mami's mind reaching out to hers. _'The entrance is clear. Come on in.'_

Nagisa got her Charlotte trumpet out and moved into the miasma. The city distorted and the mist clung to her as she stepped from the world of the living into its false reflection. Mami waited on the other side, gun still ready. "Where are the wraiths?" Nagisa asked.

"I haven't spotted them."

They both remained on guard and alert. There were wraiths around here somewhere; they could feel their presence lapping at them. Mami gestured to the only real hiding place in the yard, a covered building with tracks running into it. Its open side was facing away from them. They advanced, the older and more experienced girl in the lead. Nagisa thought she saw a flicker of shadows coming out the building.

"This doesn't feel right," Mami muttered, but kept moving up anyway.

They rounded the corner of the building and got their first look inside. Dark, abyssal blue light pulsed over them. In the middle of the room between lines of unhitched cargo cars, a shimmering portal made of latticework as fine as ice crystal hung midair.

Nagisa gaped. That was… that had to be… but weren't they gone?

"Nagisa, _run!_ " Mami shouted. "This isn't a normal wraith. Run!"

Too late. The faint presence they'd felt within the miasma surged forward, the trickle turned into a torrent. In the space of a heartbeat, the portal exploded outward to swallow the entire building, Mami and Nagisa with it. The world broke around them once again, a reflection on water with a rock thrown into it.

They plummeted, pulled downward faster than they should possibly fall on their own through a marbled hall without a floor. Mami was shouting at her, but Nagisa couldn't make it out. Train tracks and sheets of paper with lines of ink flew by her, skewed at useless angles.

The vertical entry hallway gave way, and they fell into a cavernous room of white marble. Nagisa barely got a glimpse of water below and light streaming in from windows set high above in the walls before violent cacophonous music burst over her. She knew where she was. But how? Sayaka was still alive! They just saw her earlier!

The screech of some leviathan monster rose up from the depths, drowning out the music. The water was full of floating debris; Nagisa and Mami aimed for it. Mami landed deftly on a floating cello, Nagisa on a wooden wheel with a splash. At the edge of the water, the blue silhouettes of an orchestra of musicians tore their bows over stringed instruments.

"This is a shadow," Mami called out. "The very worst and most powerful kind of wraith. You don't have the experience to fight one of these. We need to get out of here immediately!" She suited her own words by throwing a stream of ribbons up into the air, grasping for the hole in the ceiling where they fell through, but before she could reach it the ceiling shifted and flowed as though liquid to fill the gap. Mami's ribbons hit smooth marble.

Curtains began sliding shut over the windows high in the walls, dimming the room, and as each was covered they too melted into smooth stone. Mami immediately began pulling rifle after rifle and blasted away at the only target she had, the orchestra seated around the hall. The music played on even as the players fell.

"Stay on your guard." She phrased it like an order, but Mami's voice was shaking. "Run away if you see the shadow's main body. It could be in almost any form, but it's probably in the water below us. Make your way to the orchestra's stage as soon as I've killed enough to clear a safe landing."

Nagisa looked at the water they floated in. She realized with a start that some of the wooden wheels drifting in the water had blue silhouette familiars tied to the spokes. Some struggled weakly with bent-looking limbs, others lay face down and still in the water. The water rocked, almost making Nagisa slip. She didn't think the waves were because of Mami's shooting.

"Mami? I… I think something's coming."

The windows were closed and gone; the last sources of light were candelabras on the wall and chandeliers on the ceiling. The water churned. With a heave of water, up burst the monstrous armored mermaid from the depths, looking down at them with its three-eyed visor. Blade held high, it cried out again, and the music ceased as the orchestra cowered in fear and leapt into the water, abandoning their music. The labyrinth whispered, the witch runes flitted about at the edges of vision. They wouldn't mean anything to Mami, but Nagisa could read them:

 _Oktavia von Seckendorff._

"Go!" Mami shrieked. Nagisa skipped over floating wheels and instruments and podiums, heading for the now-empty orchestra's stage above water level. Gunshots sounded behind her, quickly changing position as Mami followed.

She reached the stage and turned to fire her trumpet; Oktavia's blade swatted the stream of bubbles from the air, detonating them harmlessly. Mami landed beside her. "Stay on your feet and stay on the walkway around the edge. The water is its territory."

Oktavia screeched again, and raised a gauntleted fist. Streams of water burst from the walls and ceiling—right over the candelabras and chandeliers.

In an instant, the water extinguished the lights and the entire concert hall plunged into darkness. They could hear the water falling into the sea below, bringing up the water level.

"Mami?" Nagisa asked. Water rushed as Oktavia moved somewhere in the distance. "What do we do?"

"Try to find another way out while I hold it off," Mami ordered. The crack of her rifled muskets lit her up in flashes. As her shots hit, they lit up tiny glimpses of the distant leviathan. "Try climbing to one of the water flows. And please, run if it tries to come after you!"

"How do I get up?" Nagisa wracked her brain trying to think of how one of her powers could get her up a smooth sloped wall in the dark, but came up empty short of transforming into Charlotte.

" _Jump!_ " It wasn't a suggestion, it was an order; sparks screamed along the wall above the walkway, rushing toward them. Mami and Nagisa vaulted into the air, leaving the stream of sparks to tear by beneath them. When they hit solid ground again, Nagisa stumbling in the dark, she figured out what just almost killed them: Oktavia was dragging its sword along the walkway and orchestra pit around the edge of the water.

"Try these," Mami said, and left off firing just long enough to spin a stream of ribbons into something solid around Nagisa's feet and wrists. Nagisa felt them, and found Mami had just equipped her with climbing spikes.

"Be careful," Nagisa told Mami, and jumped onto the wall. Mami immediately leaped away for a new position, drawing Oktavia's attention.

What followed was a torment. Nagisa pounded the spikes into solid stone with a strength only puella magi could muster and the inward slope of the wall was very gradual, but she could barely tell where she was going. The sound of flowing water coming down from above mingled with echoes from all directions, tricking her ear. She could hear the steady barrage of Mami's gunshots. Mami was still alive and moving. She could hear Oktavia's blade scraping stone and whooshing through air and water. But with her back to the concert hall and her face all but buried in the wall she was climbing, she couldn't turn around to see even the brief flashes of Mami's guns that might give her some idea what was happening. Every second where Mami's guns went silent, Nagisa was choked by terror that they were silent for good. Every time the echoing screech of Oktavia's sword against stone came at her from every direction, she was sure she was about to feel it shred through her. But somehow Mami stayed ahead of the behemoth and kept its attention, and every second she did was another second they lived.

The sound of water was louder and closer, even if she still couldn't tell where it was coming from. She was probably high enough to find one of the sources, if only she could bumble into one of the streams in the dark. Although… She pulled her gem off her belt and transformed it into its egg form, willing its light to shine brighter and thanking her luck that souls could double as handy flashlights. The white-purple light glinted off a stream of water, drawing out Nagisa's shuddering sigh of relief.

She scrambled over to the stream, and found it was larger around than she was. Fighting against the flow would be hard, but not impossible for puella magi with ribbons and spikes. She shone her gem into the water, trying to find its source, and then did a double take. She stuck her gem back on her belt and reached in against the current with her free hand, making sure the egg's dim light hadn't tricking her.

Her hand hit smooth wall where there should be an opening. The water was flowing from the solid rock.

Because of _course_ there wouldn't be a way of getting out if Oktavia didn't want them to leave! Witch labyrinths never made sense like that! They just did whatever they wanted! Oktavia was going to keep them here unless they could fight her off, and… and… what would that even do? If they could even beat Oktavia, what would that do to Sayaka? Wasn't this part of her soul? Oktavia felt like a wraith when they were chasing her, but this was definitely more than just a wraith!

The battle went on below her, cracking shots and the screech of Oktavia's blade on stone. She couldn't wait, even if this might hurt Sayaka.

 _'Mami?' I don't think we're getting out this way.'_ She couldn't keep the discouragement out of her voice.

 _'I… I see. Well, then. I…'_ Mami's mental voice was sick with worry. _'I'm sorry, Nagisa. You're doing very well, but this was exactly the sort of fight I was hoping to keep you out of to start with. We have no choice but to fight it, then.'_

Nagisa loosened her spikes from the wall. _'I'm coming back down!'_

 _'Aim for the lights!'_

As she fell, she saw what Mami meant. Dimly glowing yellow ribbons wrapped around the largest pieces of floating debris, lighting them up at a distance. She landed on a piano that was still plinking out a waterlogged melody, after a plummet that seemed much shorter than the distance she'd climbed. _'What about the walkway?'_

 _'Already underwater. Don't forget to keep moving!'_ Mami and her flashing guns were on the other side of the hall.

There was a dark patch where Nagisa couldn't see any of Mami's glowing ribbons; that must be Oktavia blocking the view. Nagisa brought out her trumpet and blasted a stream of bubbles at it, leaping away immediately after. _'Are we even hurting her?'_ she asked Mami.

 _'Not enough! I can't hold still long enough to bring out my stronger attacks.'_

Nagisa's bubbles hit, briefly revealing Oktavia's armor plating as they burst. Oktavia screamed. With the rush of churning water, the dark patch was suddenly gone. Everywhere she looked, Nagisa could see Mami's glowing ribbons marking floating debris. The timpani drum she stood on bobbed in the waves. _'Mami! What just happened? Where did she go?'_

 _'Oh, no. The shadow dove into the water.'_

 _'WHAT? She can hit us from below like that! What do we do?_

 _'It may not need to.'_ Mami sounded grim. _'The water flowing into the hall has sped up. I think the water level's somewhere around halfway up to the ceiling already. It'll try to drown us out and hit us when we can only fight her underwater.'_

Nagisa looked down. The weak pools of light made by Mami's ribbons barely even reached below the surface. The water underneath her feet was an unbroken blackness. They would have no light and no warning if they tried fighting there.

 _'Nagisa, I want you to stay up here as long as you can. I'm going to try fighting it underwater. I've never had to try something quite like this, but…'_ Mami sounded like she was staring down her executioner. _'Well, the body of a puella magi should be able to fight even while drowning. It's supposed to be a matter of concentration.'_

 _'Wait! I have an idea that isn't stupid! Where are you?'_

Mami responded by twirling a stream of glowing ribbons around herself. Nagisa jumped over to her and tackled her into the water with a splash.

 _'Nagisa! What are you doing?'_

 _'Hold on!'_

Nagisa pulled out her trumpet. Her trumpet made bubbles, right? Bubbles had air, right? So what if she was trying to blow bubbles underwater, magic didn't need to make sense, it just needed to be magic! And she was a herald of Madoka, so her magic was even witchier than most puella magi, so it needed to make even less sense.

She hoped her magic agreed with her about all this.

Willing her magic to express itself as she needed it to, she pressed her lips to her trumpet and blew. Instead of the strangled gurgle she half-expected, Nagisa watched as a bubble billowed out from the end and swelled until it enveloped the two of them.

They stared at each other, floating in the pocket of air just below the surface. Mami was at a complete loss for words. "That… that is…"

Nagisa nodded in complete understanding. "Magic is really stupid. Like making guns out of ribbons!"

The water reverberated with Oktavia's scream as she realized her prey found a way to breathe in her domain. Mami spun a pair of glowing ribbons around each of them, tied at the ankles. "I've enchanted these to only glow in our vision. This should help us find each other without making it easier for the shadow. Can you make more bubbles?"

Nagisa nodded and blew as hard as she could. A dozen bubbles spread out in a wide arc. Mami dove into one, and then she was just a light rapidly slipping away. _'I'll try to find the shadow and light it up. Don't draw its attention if you see it!'_ A pause. _'These bubbles won't explode like your others, will they?'_

...no, of course not. That would be stupid. Wouldn't it? Attack bubbles and breathing bubbles are different. Wouldn't they be?

 _'Nagisa?'_

 _'Um… maybe don't run into any walls?'_

 _'Nagisa!'_

 _'I don't know! I'm sorry!'_

Mami's distant light blinked out. Nagisa's heart leapt into her throat. _'Mami, are you okay?'_

At the same moment Mami sent, _'Nagisa! What happened? Are you alright?'_ Then, _'MOVE!'_

Nagisa yelped and blasted bubbles downward, slipping into one and letting it carry her deeper. Something enormous rushed right above her, pulling her off course. She tumbled head over heels, losing all sense of up and down. Stars exploded behind her eyes as she bounced face-first into something hard with a clang. Water rushed in as her bubble popped, and she was thrown along with the rush of water as the thing she'd bounced off suddenly twisted its enormous bulk.

 _'Nagisa, get away from it!'_

She blew her trumpet again, enveloping herself in a new bubble and sliding away as fast as she could. She didn't even know if she was going the right way, or where Oktavia would hit from. And a burst of light and heat and pressure erupted in water, blinding her with its sudden radiance. In the dying flash, she caught a single glimpse of Oktavia reeling and rushing away.

Mami's voice in her mind sounded steadier, bolstered by a certain grim satisfaction. _'I think I've upset it. I'll have to think of a name for that one. Do send some bubbles my way, would you?'_

Nagisa stopped spinning, found Mami's light, and blew as many air bubbles as she could in her direction. Mami flitted from bubble to bubble, dancing around the shadowy leviathan, somehow always just ahead of its blade and bulk. Nagisa couldn't imagine how Mami was doing so well. Even with the benefit of distance and a steady position, Nagisa herself could barely track where Oktavia was in the dark. Mami's ribbons flashed, twirling around her or lashing out to strike like razored snakes biting into scales and armor. From the mermaid's furious screams, it must have been doing something, but maybe no more than enraging her.

Mami tried to wrap her opponent in ribbons as they fought, anchoring the ends to the concert hall walls and tying the other around tail or wrists or anywhere she could manage. Oktavia barely seemed to notice, and tore them apart with a single thrashing motion or a negligent flick of the blade.

The only thing that seemed big enough so far to really hurt Oktavia was that explosion Mami made somehow, and she wasn't making anymore. That blast had pulled Oktavia's attention for a moment, but now as they fought she kept trying to turn back to Nagisa, who was still giving Mami an endless stream of bubbles. It seemed Oktavia wanted to try drowning them after all, if it would rather fight her instead of the one who could actually hurt her.

With a start, Nagisa felt her back bump against something hard. The stone walkway, jutting out from the wall. She hadn't even realized she was drifting, but the force of streaming bubbles from her trumpet must have slowly pushed her backward.

Wait. Mami needed time and room if she was going to do anything. Mami's ribbons weren't holding Oktavia, but maybe if she had time to make a lot of them… Nagisa would need to set the stage first, though. Light. She needed glowing bubbles, so Mami could breathe and see what she was doing. Nagisa twisted her magic into the shape she needed and blew a stream of bubbles toward the underwater walkway. The bubbles drifted to a stop as they neared their targets, and soon Nagisa had a ring of glowing bubbles scattered along the entire length of the hall. Above her, in the space that had been full of air when they first arrived, Mami and Oktavia fought. Beneath her, the depths.

 _'Mami! Let Oktavia go!'_

 _'What?'_

 _'I put bubbles around the walkway. Let the mermaid chase me, and make a net over the gap with your ribbons. When you're ready, I'll lead her into it and then you blast her!'_

 _'What? No! It's too dangerous for you!'_

 _'But we can't keep fighting her like this!'_

 _'I'll beat it somehow. I just met you, Nagisa, I won't lose you so soon!'_

 _'But you're barely hurting her. You need room to get ready.'_

Mami was silent for a long moment, ribbons flashing. When she replied, it came with the mental equivalent of holding back a sob. _'Nagisa, I forbid you to get hurt.'_

 _'Okay!'_

Mami's ribbons flashed one final more time, yanking her hard out of Oktavia's path instead of striking. Mami's mind touched Nagisa's again, as though she wanted to say something, but the only thing that came through was a wave of tense worry and nausea.

Oktavia rushed away from Mami's dim light and disappeared back into the dark water, heading straight for Nagisa. She didn't wait for the leviathan to reach her. She jumped in a bubble and slipped down as fast as she could. She left behind the ring of light and kept going into the darkest depths.

OoOoO

"The world is gray and broken."

Nagisa dove. Her glowing bubbles were too dim to be useful unless she had time to spread a bunch of them around the cavern, so she didn't bother. Mami's glowing ribbon around her ankle only made her instinctively strain her eyes trying to peer into the water, so she plucked it off and watched it disintegrate. She didn't have Mami's constant barrage of flashing guns, either. She dove alone and utterly blind into perfect blackness.

"She did it. _She_ did it!"

Instinct and her magic senses alone saved her. Oktavia came, and Nagisa barely escaped her blows, rushing aside out of her path. The magic of Oktavia's labyrinth pressed in on every side, but Oktavia herself was a boiling flood of anger that beat against Nagisa's mind even though she could not see it. She gave up on her eyes. Blindness, adrenaline, and being one misstep away from catastrophe focused her magical senses to a razor's edge. Oktavia came, but Nagisa felt her coming, and fled.

"My only path is into the darkness. The only one she's left me."

But even though she was blind, Nagisa still saw. A sky of black feathers rising in the wind. Miss Akemi, laughing with scorn, liquid purple fire dripping from the skeletal black wings emerging from her bloody torn back. A goddess pulled from the heavens by the devil's hand. Together, they plummeted to the earth as a falling morning star. Visions swam before Nagisa's eyes and into her mind as though the water itself was tainted with them.

And above it all, she saw a pair of icy blue eyes, twisted in fury, staring into her from the dark as she heard Sayaka's voice.

" _The devil will fall! I swear it!_ "

The unrelenting anger radiating out from Oktavia flooded over her, and Nagisa drowned in it until she could hold herself back no longer. She turned and stopped running. She threw herself at Oktavia. They clashed, they strove and snarled and ripped at one another. Oktavia's sword cut into her side, and her teeth tore into the mermaid's scaly tail. The sword was lost, and they grappled, hands on throat, long sinuous body constricting around armor.

 _'Nagisa! I'm done! Nagisa, are you okay? Where are you?'_

The voice cut through the haze of violence.

 _'Mami?'_

 _'Oh, thank goodness, thank goodness you're still okay! Lead it back, the trap is ready!'_

Mami. Nagisa struggled to look around until she found the ring of bubbles she'd left around the walkway, somewhere off to her right, now joined by a ring made from the frayed ends of glowing ribbons. She needed to go. Mami was ready for her. She escaped Oktavia's grapple by shifting back into her human form (when had she become Charlotte?) and immediately made a bubble, rising toward the light. Oktavia gave chase, screaming wretchedly. The cavern beneath was vaster by far than the concert hall above, but she was gaining speed.

She passed the ring of light. Behind her, a net of hidden ribbons suddenly became corporeal and leapt out to tangle its prey. Oktavia screamed in indignant rage as it was caught, but far louder to Nagisa was Mami's clear voice:

 _'Tiro Finale Torpedo!'_

A trio of propelled golden warheads tore past her, and a burst of light bright enough to illuminate the entire concert hall one last time bloomed in the deep.

OoOoO

The labyrinth dissolved, and they were back in the train yard. Mami landed gracefully. Nagisa fell bonelessly to the ground. Even though her entire side was burning in pain, it seemed more important to look up at the sky. After the pitch black water, the field of stars and the half-moon felt impossibly radiant and sweet.

"Nagisa, you're hurt!" Mami knelt by her. "Don't move! I—I'll take care of it. Don't move, don't move." There was something terrified in her voice at seeing new friend lying injured on the ground, almost a whimper, and her hands shook as she pulled out a fistful of grief cubes and dropped them where they could absorb grief from both their gems. Nagisa felt a spread of ribbons wrapping her side, followed by a warm light. She tried to look down, but only caught a glimpse of blood spread around her before Mami's hand caught her chin and firmly tilted it back up.

Most of her lower body just felt… numb. Sluggish. Strings of her magic wove through her body, doing the work of nerves and tendons, letting her move and act. She hadn't even noticed doing that during the fight. She got the distinct impression that if she weren't a puella magi, she wouldn't feel her lower half at all. The cut must be as far as… no, don't think about it don't think about it!

They won. They were alive. They won, and… Oktavia… Horror gripped her. What had she done? She killed Oktavia. Oktavia would have killed her if she hadn't, but what happened to Sayaka now? She… she needed to know. She needed to know everything she could, right now.

"Mami, the mermaid, you… you called it a sh-shadow. What is that? Where do they c-come from?" If Mami thought the shakiness in her voice was from the cut in her side, good.

"What? O-oh. Yes. Shadows." Mami seemed to want to work, but also recognized the chance to keep Nagisa distracted from the wound. "They're a special class of wraith. I've… only seen a few, and heard about a few more. You remember where wraiths come from, don't you?"

"Bad emotions."

"More or less. The pain and curses seem out from human spirits and coalesce into wraiths. But there's another source of negative emotional energy as well, one all the more potent because it's already entwined with magic. If a puella magi is overwhelmed by a curse in her heart, one so strong that she cannot resolve it and cannot bear it herself, then over time she forms a shadow, just as normal humans form wraiths. It's very rare, thankfully."

Nagisa shuddered. "And that means someone in the city is…"

"Perhaps, perhaps not. Since shadows are so much more powerful than normal wraiths, they can survive much longer. Our mermaid may have wandered in from another city. It could even be very old, surviving long after the girl herself. If we see this mermaid again, then we'll know that one of the puella magi in Mitakihara is making shadows."

"We might see her again? Even after beating her once?"

"Yes. I…" Mami looked like she was remembering something very painful. "There have been shadows I've seen more than once before." For just an instant, witch runes skittered at the edge of Nagisa's vision as she looked up at Mami's strained face. _Candeloro. Ophelia._

Enormous relief flooded through her. If puella magi could keep making the same shadow over and over, then that had to meant she hadn't really killed _Oktavia_ , just a, well, shadow of her.

Mami finished working on Nagisa's side and leaned back. "This should hold you together for now. It may be we'll both have to take some time off from school, and I think we'll be bumping up our lessons on healing. Fortunately, shadows always drop a grief cube with very high capacity. Hold tight a moment while I find it, okay?"

Except… except did it even matter if Sayaka still had Oktavia somewhere in her? Sayaka was spawning witches! Did she even know she was doing that? Did Sayaka even know what was going on at all, about anything in this world? And Nagisa couldn't tell her—couldn't tell her or Madoka anything at all. She didn't dare. And here she was, lying almost cut in half from fighting Oktavia, who wasn't anywhere near as scary as the Great Curse she was supposed to beat, and she only wanted to do _that_ because _Miss Akemi_ told her to, even though she was supposed to be freeing Madoka from Miss Akemi but she had no idea how, and… and… she didn't know what to _do!_

"Here, I found the… oh dear." Mami tucked their prize away and, sitting by Nagisa, carefully gathered her up in a hug. The ribbon-bandages around her side stretched uncomfortably, and something slid out of place. The tears she'd been fighting back finally burst, and she clung to Mami and bawled into her shirt.

"Let it out," Mami said, rubbing circles on her back. "I know it's scary, I know it hurts. You've been very brave, and it's okay to cry." Mami picked Nagisa up as carefully as she could and carried her out of the train yard. Getting back to the apartment took a long time, since they couldn't go roof jumping with her wound, but Mami carried her the whole way home through the night. Nagisa cried herself out, and sank into a fitful doze in Mami's arms along the way.

OoOoO

* * *

Poetry excerpt from _Paradise Lost_ , John Milton.


	4. Chapter 4

.

* * *

OoOoO

 **A Curse Between Us**

 **Chapter 4**

OoOoO

* * *

Her samurai dashed across the screen, waves of mooks collapsing in the wake of his passing as they each fell to a single stroke of the sword. With simulated speaker-blasted screams, the horde of obstacles peeled away until only the level boss, the enemy general draped in a cloak of crow feathers, stood between her and victory.

Their history teacher at school once mentioned that the golden age of the samurai story had been in the Edo period, when samurai theater burst into massive popularity. In Edo, the real-life samurai themselves were already on their way to irrelevance as a unified Japan relaxed into peace and the age of the merchant and the bureaucrat. The samurai plays that so gripped the public consciousness, tales of daring and honor and duty, were mostly spun out of fanciful romanticism. Stories infected the public mind, driving out the historical memory of reality.

Sayaka hated that lecture.

Her little play-actor slumped to the ground, bleeding out from a dozen wounds, and Sayaka mashed the buttons to make the continuation countdown plummet to zero.

"Yo, Blue!" Kyouko bounded up to her through the arcade, landing with her whole upper body leaning on the control deck of the samurai game. "You having fun yet?"

"This game is stupid." Sayaka still entered her name into the high score rankings anyway.

"Oh come on, don't be like that! Just find a new one then. In fact…" Kyouko leaned out in front of Sayaka, blocking the screen. "I got an idea for some fun."

"Oh really?"

"You know what I'm after, Blue. Only one reason I come to the arcade, isn't there?"

Sayaka looked off to the side. "We should figure out what we're going to do about the upswing in wraiths."

"Really? _Really?_ The sun is shining so hard it's gonna burn someone's face off, the birds are out there squawking about how much they want to hook up before the day's done, and you want to spend our beautiful Sunday afternoon talking strategy?"

"If it's such a great day, why are we indoors in a noisy arcade?"

"You know what I think?" Kyouko pulled herself up to sit on the game's control deck and leered at Sayaka with a fanged smile. "I think you're chicken."

Sayaka felt her lips quirking upward into a grin, but forced a glower. "Say that again, jackass."

Kyouko leaned in closer, supporting her arms on Sayaka's shoulders. " _Bawk bawk bawk baaawk._ "

"We can talk about wraiths after I beat your ass into the ground," Sayaka declared. She lifted Kyouko bodily off the machine, smiled at her friend's cheers, and carried her over to the DDR machines.

One of the regular customers saw them heading there and sent up the general alarm. By the time they'd taken their places, they had a crowd of regulars and curious newcomers gathered around them. Sayaka and Kyouko didn't look all that different than the other kids, teens, and college students who visited this place, but word had gotten around that when a pair of girls, one with short blue hair and the other with waist-length crimson hair, got on the DDR machines, you forgot about whatever game you were playing and watched the show instead.

"Hey hey, look at this! They got new songs!"

"Must've released a new pack." They shared a grin. "Grab the hardest one and crank it up to challenge!"

The song didn't seem to understand the concepts of "warming up" or "mercy." Right from the first note they had a blaze of arrows scrolling across the screen at speeds that almost required memorizing the entire song to get anything done. They didn't care. They hit them all with inhuman reflexes, moving together in perfect time. The crowd cheered as their combos climbed higher.

"Hey, did they really say they never done this one before? There's no way, right? That's gotta be BS."

"Never seen them before, have you? Hang around man, you'll get used to them doing this."

"You should see their freestyle, you could just set up a camera and make a music video of it."

Kyouko was the one who first dragged Sayaka onto the DDR machines after they met, but Sayaka took to them fast enough. DDR reminded her of fighting, the only time her head was truly clear anymore. Whether it was combat instincts telling her she needed to move _now_ and strike _here_ or music pounding and arrows flashing across the screen telling her to hit these pads in this order, she knew exactly what she needed to do at a basic level and her body responded perfectly to her certainty. It was simple, in a way nothing else was. There was only the moment, no false past or rigged future. When she was fighting and dancing, she could forget how gray the world was.

Sayaka and Kyouko pounded the last step as the music cut. The crowd around them burst into applause as they laughed with exhilaration and took their bows.

And then, a twinge of hate at the edges of their minds.

 _'_ _You feel that, Blue?'_

 _'_ _Wraiths.'_

 _'_ _In a damn hurry, too.'_

The miasma was on the hunt, moving as fast as any Sayaka'd ever seen. And it was heading unerringly in their direction.

 _'_ _So let's go out and meet it.'_

OoOoO

Sayaka remembered how they met.

She'd been patrolling months ago a little before midnight, and just entered the last bank of miasma in the area. She had only been puella magi a few weeks, but stubborn dedication and flying solo had developed her skills faster than the wraiths could kill her. A flash of crimson caught her eye. A girl with a spear was already in the park covered by the miasma, fighting six wraiths off with a spear and cursing them out at the top of her lungs.

Her spear was segmented, the pieces joined by chains and writhing like a thing alive in her hands as she twisted and wove through her swarming enemies. It flailed and struck, keeping the wraiths at bay. But it was a duelist's weapon, meant to entangle a single foe. Using that tactic against one in a group of six would leave her defenseless against the other five, and the blunt flailing segments of the spear weren't doing damage fast enough on their own. The girl would win eventually through sheer attrition if she could keep up her flawless dance, even alone. She was just that good, Sayaka could see it. But if she slipped up, the wraiths would have an opening and swarm her.

Sayaka didn't hesitate. _'_ _Coming in on your left!'_

She cut one apart on her way in. The crimson girl took advantage of the wraith's sudden shock to strike snakelike with the head of her spear, piercing a second wraith through the core of its body. From there Sayaka slid easily inside the crimson girl's guard, chains whirling around them as they stood back to back.

"I fucking had 'em on the run, kid! Don't need your goddamn help!"

"Don't mind me, I'm just getting my exercise!"

"Fine, whatever. We're rushing the ones on your front, then. Go!"

Sayaka stormed the closest wraith, and the crimson girl's flailing spear kept the others from counterattacking. As if they'd practiced this together a hundred times, they moved in tandem, protecting the other's back, striking like two weapons held by the same warrior, timing their blows to take advantages of openings the other created. The swarm of wraiths found themselves divided, scattered, and torn apart by the two comrades.

Afterward, they sat spread out on the grass in the park beneath a tree's canopy. The crimson girl laughed. "Alright, I'll admit it, counting heads and taking names hasn't been that fun in a long time. I'm actually glad you showed up and butted in." She whipped out a bag of peach gummies, shook a few into her mouth, and held the bag out with a fanged grin. "Sakura Kyouko."

"Miki Sayaka," she replied as she took a handful and popped one in her mouth. "I guess it is kind of fun when you're winning, isn't it?"

"Damn sight better than losing. Where'd you learn to dance like that? I haven't seen you around before."

"I learned on my own. I've only been doing this a few weeks."

Kyouko looked over at in her in surprise. "Really. You kick a lot of ass for a greenie."

"Well it seemed like a better idea than sucking and not getting anything done."

"Fair enough." Kyouko kipped up off the grass and began to walk away, stepping onto a walkway lit from overhead. "Anyway, I'm gonna find someplace warmer. Hope I run into you again, Blue."

Sayaka eyed her. The flowing red cloth of Kyouko's puella magi outfit was dignified, almost venerable, and called to mind the robes of a holy man, but she'd dropped those after they gathered the grief cubes and cleansed their gems. The only thing her actual clothing had in common with the layered crimson skirts was the cute poofy black bow in her hair. Sayaka didn't think anyone complaining about the cold chose that thin black tank top because they liked its look, and the ratty blue-green jacket thrown over it wasn't much thicker. Her short cut-off jeans were so worn that they certainly hadn't started their life as deliberate cut-offs. The boots that ran almost up to her knees were the only part of her outfit that looked sturdy, and even those were scuffed up and down their length.

"Hey," Sayaka called out. Kyouko stopped. "You got a place to stay?"

"I'd call that more of a second date question, kid," Kyouko said, face flat and good humor gone.

"I'm serious. You can crash in my room tonight, sneak out in the morning, then I bring you home and introduce you to Mom and get you set up for real sometime tomorrow. I can't tell her I met you out fighting monsters when she thought I was in bed, but she wouldn't mind at all if I said a friend of mine needed a place to sleep."

"And what do you even care for? You just met me. Don't go throwing your charity out to whoever wants to leech it off you, Blue. We already lost enough with this puella magi gig. Just go back to your cozy little cottage. Me, I'm going to find a hotel to break into. See you, loser."

Sayaka jumped to her feet and chased Kyouko down. She grabbed the other girl's shoulder and spun her around. "I care because it isn't right!"

Kyouko shot her a glare of pure venom. "Shit, you're just like _her_ , aren't you? I don't give a fucking damn what you say about me stealing food or breaking into hotels. I'm no one's martyr, bitch, and if you think different I'll break every damn bone in your body."

"No, I mean it's not right you need to steal and live on the street! Didn't you say we already lost enough? We're the only ones who can fight the wraiths, we're out here trying to protect everyone, and you're living on handouts and breaking into hotel rooms? Where's the justice in that? Where are you parents?"

"Dead, motherfucker, dead because of my goddamn stupid wish!" Kyouko shoved Sayaka back hard, breaking her grip on her shoulder. "Newsflash, dumbass: the world doesn't run on justice. The world doesn't care we're out here bleeding and dying and vanishing without a trace. People don't know we're the only reason they're not getting eaten by giant toga freaks, and like hell they'd care if they did." Kyouko laughed, right in Sayaka's face, and shot her a cruel leer. "Now go blubber and cry, bitch, 'cause come down to it, all you hero-types are exactly the same, just a bunch of sniveling cowards without the _spine_ to back up your"

Sayaka punched her in the face.

The pure shock of it was probably the only reason Kyouko didn't immediately pounce on Sayaka and wreck her shit. Instead, she reeled back and stared dumbfounded, giving Sayaka the crucial split-second she needed to grab her by the jacket and lift her off the ground.

"I don't give a fuck if the world's rotten!" Sayaka shouted. "If the world's as messed up as you think it is, then I'll just be better! I'm not telling the universe to give you back your parents, I'm telling _you_ I'll give you a bed in my house! And if you don't want it, I'll fucking break your legs, drag your ass home, and spoon feed you pudding while I nurse you back to health!"

Kyouko's soul gem transmuted off her ring finger and into her hand as an egg. A burst of crimson light, and a spear snapped out from the gem's crimson depths. It hit Sayaka with the flat of the blade, knocking her away. She fell on her rear, but kept rolling into a backward somersault onto her feet. She got ready to block or punch, and stopped.

Kyouko was laughing.

Kyouko was hunched over with her hands on her knees, barely keeping herself upright, completely overcome with the sudden laughter. "You," Kyouko managed through the laughter. "Listen to you! You're _ridiculous_!"

Sayaka scowled. "Not that ridiculous."

"Yeah, you are." Kyouko took a few long, deep breaths. "Gonna break my legs as a personal favor to me out of the goodness of your heart. Right. Well if you're going to be a bitch about it, maybe I will crash at your place awhile. You know, just to keep all the other, less deserving leeches away from a naïve little girl like you." Kyouko grinned, wolfish fang poking out. "Least you've got guts, Blue."

Sayaka took a moment to fantasize about punching her in the face again, then stepped closer and raised her hands to the black eye already forming on Kyouko's face. "Here, hold still."

With the faintest hint of music and a dim blue light, the bruise vanished in seconds. Kyouko blinked in surprise, raising a hand to her eye. "That felt… that felt clean. Fresh. Huh. I'm pretty sure the bone was cracked, too." Kyouko looked at Sayaka, suddenly looking much more relaxed. "Food, a place to crash, and healing. You keep being this useful, I just might have to keep you."

That was how Sayaka remembered meeting Kyouko for the first time.

The memory was washed out and gray, an ancient crumbling parchment with its lines of notes barely legible, an artifice. Growing up in Mitakihara, hugging a sobbing Madoka before she boarded the plane to America, realizing with horror what she'd done by making such a selfish wish to heal Kyousuke's hand… all of it gray, all of it faked, all of it _not hers_.

There were flashes of color, flashes of things she knew. Madoka, Madoka in a pink dress, Madoka with golden eyes, and an overwhelming sense of gratitude so strong it nearly brought Sayaka to tears. Being lost in a dark ocean, endlessly entranced by music as she recalled glimmers of light and a life of dedication. The betrayer. A raging battle of monsters through the streets of Mitakihara.

And the first memory longer than a flash, the first memory secure in her mind, the first she knew was truly _hers_ …

The sky blotted out with black feathers. Akemi, standing at the riverside, so confident, so superior, smiling at her defiance with _amusement_ , lips parted. "Then I suppose I shall deign to be your enemy when the time is ready. But do you really think you can stand against me, Miki Sayaka?"

And then the wound in her heart, the hole where something greater than herself had been torn away, and a longing pain for someplace else, someplace she couldn't remember.

And the gray memories were slowly pushing their way in, trying to bleed with color.

She was a stranger here.

OoOoO

The miasma broke, and Kyouko came back with a handful of grief cubes. They'd already shifted back to their civvies when they reappeared, so even in daylight they looked like no one unordinary. "Alright, fine, I'll admit I see your point," she said as she handed half over to Sayaka. "Wraiths in this city are all lunatics. DDR's out for the day, but we can talk about it while we eat, try to figure out what's up with them. Damn it, the way they're coming out of the woodwork, it's like every single traffic jam or stack of homework in the city is pissing people off enough to make its own wraith swarm. We need to get Kyubey over here, maybe he knows something."

"Hey Kyouko." By chance, they'd intercepted the wraiths in the very same park where they'd first met. Or, hadn't really met, but remembered meeting. "Have we met before? Before I punched you out and dragged you home, I mean. Maybe someplace far away, or a long time ago. Did we meet in another life?"

Kyouko looked ready to jump on the bit about punching her out and dragging her home. Couldn't let a jab to her honor go unsnarked at, after all. But something in Sayaka's expression brought her up short. "What, you mean like reincarnation or something?"

"Or even just as kids. Maybe my Mom showed up to your family's church one Sunday? Or we passed in the street while our parents were pushing us around in strollers and we thought to ourselves, 'I'm going to grow up and fight monsters with her one day.'" She laughed, pressing shaky hands to her forehead. "Anything, anything at all! Anything to explain how I feel."

"Anything's possible, I guess." Kyouko hovered over her, caught between reaching out and not disturbing the minor freak-out in process. "You okay, Blue? Where's this coming from?"

"I don't know, I don't even know. How can I?" Would it be so bad? She almost wanted that memory of their first meeting to be true. She almost wanted to embrace it as hers. If her memories were to be believed, that brawl in the park led to a camaraderie that made the long fight bearable. She'd never fall as long as she had Kyouko watching her back, and she'd keep Kyouko from falling to the dark in return.

"Sayaka…" Kyouko edged closer, still unsure what to do. Sayaka had no such hesitations. She stepped forward and dragged Kyouko close, clinging to her like a life preserver. The other girl squawked before returning the hug, holding Sayaka as she trembled. If it was all fake, if it was all Akemi's lie, then why did this feel so _right_? Why had she been waiting for a chance to stand like this with Kyouko?

Why did she want this so badly?

Her feet left the ground as Kyouko hefted her into a princess carry and brought her to the tree they'd rested under eating peach gummies (but that never happened) and set her down under its shade. Kyouko sat behind her, her back against the tree, and Sayaka scooted back to lean against her. Kyouko's arms slid around her.

They sat in perfect silence, not wanting to ruin the moment. They were so used to butting heads and snarking that if they opened their mouths to say so much as "well isn't this comfy?" odds were good that they'd be flinging insults inside of fifteen seconds. Even as jokes, that didn't belong here.

Even worse would be honesty—if Kyouko tried to tell Sayaka how worried she was and drove her to put up her happy mask, if Sayaka wondered aloud whether every moment they'd shared was a lie. So they sat there without speaking, Kyouko trying her best to soothe problems she didn't know and Sayaka unable to name her pain aloud.

They sat so long Sayaka could almost believe the day had paused and the world was revolving around them. But that wasn't true at all, was it? There were two people in this world infinitely more important than she was. Perhaps she could say the world revolved around them. She wanted to stay here forever, but there was work to be done. "We really should talk about the wraiths," she said.

Kyouko started. "Huh? What's that? Wraiths. Right, wraiths."

"…were you asleep?"

"Maybe. So, wraiths."

"Wraiths." Sayaka took a deep breath. "I think we should go after the Great Curse."

"Eh? But that's Mami's territory!"

"We've been getting weird wraiths for weeks with no clue what's causing them, but the Great Curse is already the biggest anomaly around here." Sayaka twisted around to half-face Kyouko. "If we want to find out what's really wrong with Mitakihara, starting with the biggest, deepest crack seems like a safe bet."

"It's gotta be fine, though. If the Great Curse is acting up, I'm sure Mami would go looking for help." Kyouko slapped a hand over her forehead. "The hell am I saying, her only options are ice queen Akemi, newbie Miki, and _me_. She's probably running around in circles freaking out trying to keep that thing in line herself."

Sayaka turned away from Kyouko and laughed. "Also. Well, you know. I may have been sneaking into Tomoe's territory to get a look at it. She might have thrown me out once or twice."

"God dammit, Blue!" Kyouko bopped her on the back of the head. "Fine, whatever. There's this voice at the back of my head that sounds suspiciously like you, and it's been nagging me to set things right with Mami anyway."

"Pretty sure that's called your conscience."

"Huh, right, forgot I had one of those. Knew I'd have to do this sooner or later somehow. I'll try to nab her at school or something, see if she's willing to not shoot my face off for the shit she and me did."

"Thanks for that!"

"You're gonna be the death of me, Mickey."

They lapsed into silence again, enjoying the sunlight playing through the branches of their shade tree. Sayaka looked out over the park, and… padding through the grass toward them…

 _'_ _Hello, girls.'_

the enemy, the enemy that tore them open and devoured everything inside

writhing on the ground, agony lancing through her, red eyes leering as it explained that this was a favor, paw pushing into her soul, sadistic fuck

 _'_ _Now, that's simply uncalled for.'_

don't let it lie don't let it trap kill it kill it kill kill kill kill kill

 _'_ _Interesting that my presence should provoke this reaction, though. According to Akemi Homura, you shouldn't recall enough to react this strongly. Perhaps the retention of just enough information while lacking context and structure is the reason the reaction is so uncontrolled, though? In fact, that may explain many of your difficulties in general. I'm not entirely convinced Akemi Homura knows what she's doing. Broad memory wipes can be quite tricky when you want to leave the subject functional, but even so, I never would have botched one this badly.'_

"Betrayer! Liar!"

"Whoa, Blue! Sayaka! Calm the fuck down!"

Kill it before it poisoned everything, kill it before it led them all to destruction. She couldn't move her arms anymore, couldn't reach it. She pushed a phantom sword out through her gem instead. It pierced Kyubey's head and pinned it twitching to the grass.

 _'_ _Really, now. This is unproductive.'_

"END YOU!"

"The hell are you still doing here, Kyubey? Get out of here!"

 _'_ _I wanted to talk. Once Miki Sayaka calms down, we can do so.'_

"Idiot, she's not calming down til you're gone! Out!"

 _'_ _Such irrational beings. This is generating unnecessary work for me, you know.'_

Sayaka twisted and writhed, struggling to get loose. "He's gone, calm down for God's sake! I'll move your gem out of range if I have to! He's gone, okay?"

It's gone. The message trickled through the righteous fury and brought her back. She was lying on the ground, wrapped in a net of Kyouko's chains. "Let me out."

"Are you calm yet?"

" _Yes I am perfectly calm!_ "

The chains vanished, but Kyouko didn't relax. "So, yeah, Blue. I know the bunnycat's got spares, but seriously, what was that?"

Bisected, pinned by quivering swords to trees or lawn, gouged open and white spongy innards spilling out. Bits and pieces of at least a dozen Kyubeys littered the park.

Sayaka sat up and dismissed her swords. Kyouko was waiting, but her head… pounding, the phantom pain of her missing life. She couldn't explain this. They remembered Kyubey being nothing but helpful, no matter how vicious a lie that was. If she were as slippery as the bastard maybe she could come up with something, but now her head was pounding itself open.

"Don't trust him." She put as much force and command and pleading into it as she could. "I'm going on patrol."

Kyouko stared at her. "What? No, don't run off, you idiot!" She jumped forward and grabbed Sayaka's cloak. "At least clean your gem first!"

Sayaka looked down at the gem over her navel. It was roiling with grief. "I'll clean it soon as I'm away from _that_ , I promise." She pointed at the array of dead Kyubeys, then tugged her cloak free and leapt away.

Kyouko sighed. There was no one left in the park to see Sayaka take to the air; they all ran when she'd started screaming and throwing swords around. No doubt they were getting the Kyubey mental massage treatment. Sayaka was supposed to be the one was careful about this sort thing, damn it. Kyouko prepared to jump after her.

 _'_ _Wait a moment if you could, Sakura Kyouko.'_

Kyouko looked around. "No, damn you, I've got places to be."

 _'_ _Surely she'll be fine on her own for a few moments. Besides, Miki Sayaka is precisely what I want to talk about.'_

Kyouko paused, eyes narrow. Sayaka was already out of sight, and if Kyubey knew something… "Alright, so talk. Fast."

 _'_ _Thank you.'_ Kyubey's latest body trotted down from the branches of the tree they'd been sitting under. _'_ _Firstly, wugh!'_ he said as Kyouko yanked him off the trunk and dangled him in front of her.

"Firstly, you're gonna tell me what you did to set Sayaka off on her marshmallow killing spree."

 _'_ _I'm as puzzled as you are on that count. I don't recall ever treating Miki Sayaka any differently than I would any other puella magi.'_

"Well think harder, bub, because that? That right there?" Still holding Kyubey in one hand, she waved him toward the killing grounds, where other Incubator bodies were already leading resource reclamation efforts by devouring the fallen. "That's got a reason behind it. A girl doesn't just wake up one day and go, hey I know, I'm gonna go on a screaming murder rampage! That sounds fun!"

 _'_ _Perhaps she regrets making her contract and irrationally blames me? I recall her having difficulties with the nature of the transformation the contract works on your bodies.'_

Kyouko grunted in annoyance and tossed Kyubey aside; he landed nimbly on all fours and scratched his face with a hind paw. "That's old news for her and you know it. It's gotta be more recent, she never used to flip out like that around you."

Kyubey cocked its head. _'_ _Is that what you remember, Sakura Kyouko?'_

"Whaddaya mean? Of course she's never treated you like target practice, not that I saw anyway. I'd remember that kind of splatter." Kyouko stopped short, tugging at her ponytail as she thought. "Actually, come to that, have I _ever_ seen you two together?"

 _'_ _Regardless, I'm hoping you could bring a message to Miki Sayaka for me. I haven't been able to approach her due to exactly this sort of reaction, but I'd very much like to talk with her if she can bring herself not to kill me. You can also tell her not to worry about the wasted bodies or the work I'm doing to erase the memories of witnesses to her outburst. The unnecessary expenditure is regrettable, but I bear her no ill will. I'd be grateful if you could pass that along.'_

"What, that's it? You just want me to run a message? I thought you actually knew what was up with her!"

 _'_ _But I do.'_

"What?!" Kyouko dropped to her knees in front of Kyubey and leaned down to be closer to him. "Really? Really really?"

 _'_ _Really.'_

Kyouko threw her arms up. "Whoo! Finally, some good news!"

Kyubey watched her.

"Well?" Kyouko rolled back to a sitting position and pulled out a celebratory stick of pocky. "So what's up?"

 _'_ _Unfortunately, I cannot say.'_

They stared at each other for a second before Kyouko burst into violent swearing. "Seriously? _Seriously?_ "

 _'_ _Seriously.'_

"Oh, for fuck's sake!" Kyouko punched the ground, leaving a hole inches deep. "Wait, holdup, this is one of your stupid rules, isn't it? The one about not giving dirt on puella magi to other puella magi without their say so? But me and Sayaka aren't at odds or nothing, so it's okay, right?"

 _'_ _I take my standards of conduct very seriously. Besides, if Sayaka is hiding information you want to uncover, then you are technically at odds even if you're not competing for grief cubes or territory.'_ A spear blade hit him in the forehead, tore through his skull, split him down his body, and severed his bushy tail. The two halves flopped to either side.

Kyouko lowered her gem. "Okay, I see the appeal. Gonna have to apologize to Blue for stopping her."

 _'_ _However, I can say that if you want to find out more, you may be able to persuade some information from Akemi Homura.'_

"The hell is that supposed to mean?" Kyouko shot a glare at the newest Kyubey, which had walked out from behind the tree trunk.

 _'_ _It means, quite simply, that Akemi Homura knows the cause of Miki Sayaka's recent problems. If you consider that useful information, then please consider passing my message along to your partner in return.'_

Kyubey slipped behind the tree again. Kyouko stuck her head around it, but he'd already vanished. The Kyubey cleanup crew had already finished eating themselves and ran off to the same wherever-they-went-when-they-vanished. The body Kyouko speared was still lying there, but it seemed Kyubey wasn't going to retrieve that until Kyouko herself was gone. It looked like the furry rat bastard really had said all he was going to say for now.

Kyouko scoffed and sent out a pulse, feeling for Sayaka's mind. _'_ _Hey Mickey, where you at?'_

Sayaka took so long to respond that Kyouko thought she wasn't going to for a minute. _'_ _Patrolling.'_

 _'_ _Fine, whatever, if you need space that badly, far be it from me to hang around my best friend. At least tell me you cleaned your gem.'_

 _'_ _Clean as a whistle! You don't need to worry about little old Sayaka!'_

 _'_ _Okay, no, you don't get to do this. You don't get to grin and act like nothing's wrong after that, Blue. Talk to me, will you?'_

 _'_ _Can I ask for a favor? I promised Madoka I'd drop by and tell her more about puella magi today. I don't want her to see me like this. Could you go see her in my place?'_

 _'_ _What? It's not Pigtails I'm worried about here!'_

 _'_ _Please? I'll be fine.'_

 _'_ _Oi, where are you?'_

The sense of Sayaka's mind faded. Kyouko got no reply, no matter how she called out.

OoOoO

The betrayer Kyubey was loose. Loose and _trusted_ , and she couldn't do anything to stop him. Sayaka sat slumped on the roof of Mitakihara's concert hall, head in her hands. Memory told her that the bastard loyally assisted puella magi, and if she needed any more proof of how twisted Akemi's world was, then the mass of seething hatred she felt at the mere thought of Kyubey being _trusted_ was enough.

She should go drag Akemi out her of her apartment and fight her then and there. Just two swords, bow and shield. She ached to do _something_ , but she knew who would win that fight. Her enemy was a monstrously powerful puella magi, just being near her was enough to feel her magic saturating the air with the taste of rusted gears and wine. Besides that, the devil had other tricks, ones Sayaka didn't know and couldn't counter. Otherwise she wouldn't be in this position.

Better to come at her sideways. She hated it, but it was the only thing she could do. Keep Madoka away from her. But that was impossible. They were already friends, and Madoka hated seeing her friends fighting. All she could do was wait for the devil to slip up and show her true colors in front of the others.

But the world, there were things in the world to learn about, cracks to explore. The wraiths were acting wrong. And the Great Curse, a desolate abomination. Akemi's world was _wrong_ , cracked from its foundation, and she would find clues in the Great Curse what she could do with those cracks, she was sure of it.

She only needed to wait. Kyouko promised to talk Tomoe. She'd gotten a few looks at the thing from the outside and wanted to rush and break the Great Curse open, find out what secrets it hid, but she needed to wait. It was the best path for now. She had to wait, while Kyubey ran free and Akemi did as she pleased and Madoka slid deeper and deeper in with Akemi with every passing day.

And all of a sudden, a magical presence was there behind her on the rooftop as if sprung from the world itself. Sayaka jerked her head up and turned to see Akemi strolling toward her. She was in her puella magi clothing, shield on her arm chattering quietly as its clockworks spun. "Whatever else may change, Miki, you still find ways to frustrate me with all sorts of puzzles."

"If you're looking for an apology, go ahead and try holding your breath. I wish I could do worse than aggravate you."

Homura shot her a tight smile. "No apology necessary. Believe it or not, I can imagine worse fates than putting up with you."

"So, what problem am I giving you this time?"

"You've handed me something of a balancing act. Continue behaving so erratically, and the others will worry for your sanity." Akemi walked a circle around her, hand on her chin as if examining a compelling specimen. "On one hand, it's useful to me if they mistrust your insights. On the other, their worry might lead them to dig for answers more than they ought. The trap applies to you too, of course. It's a fine line between discrediting yourself and nudging them to action. You blundered too far in one direction today."

Her blood simmered, but she somehow couldn't work up the indignation to make an issue of it. She couldn't even find time to collect herself without Akemi knowing and strolling in to taunt her. And of course she couldn't get away with the actual fuckup without being seen. She suspected from the start that Akemi was keeping a tight watch on her. Being able to intercept her meeting with… Tomoe's new trainee, or whoever she was, was simple enough evidence of that. Akemi probably laughed herself silly watching her rush about stabbing Kyubeys in a blind rage. "Don't you have better things to do than spy on me?" She knew she sounded worn and tired and bitter. She couldn't help it.

Akemi shrugged. "Usually, yes. I can't personally pay attention to everything in my domain, after all. But this time, the Incubator simply told me what fun you two were having."

Sayaka stiffened in shock. "You—you're working with him?! Even knowing what he is, you listen to him?"

Akemi's lips curled up, as if she found that funny. Sayaka's blood was pounding again, the boiling anger perpetually sitting in her gut swelling again.

Fuck waiting.

She transformed into her duelist's uniform in a blue surge of magic, already charging Homura with a wordless snarl before the sword even finished forming in her hand. Akemi was ready, dancing back out of reach.

"We've done this so many times, Miki, and only once have you managed to gain the upper hand."

Akemi stepped just out of range every time Sayaka's blades tore pointlessly through the air. Sayaka was fighting sloppily and some corner of her head knew it, but she couldn't stop. This was artless rushing. But Homura knew what Kyubey was, knew him for his lies and betrayal, knew the danger he posed, and she was _cooperating_ with him? Sayaka bullrushed her, trying to force her way through the careful precise dodges. Akemi's shield—held on the far side of her body, where it was harder for Sayaka to interfere with—chattered and whirred, and Sayaka stumbled through thin air where her enemy had been an instant before.

"You couldn't push your advantage to finish it then, and right now you're a pale shadow of what you used to be. What are you hoping to accomplish with this little squabble?"

She twisted flung two swords hard at Akemi's new position, whirling like buzzsaws, one high to take her head off, the other vertical toward the center of her body to split her in half. Akemi spun low and to the side, and both tore past her without doing more than fluttering her hair with their wind. Sayaka pulled another sword and charged again, driving forward with the point to impale. Instead of nimbly flowing away again, Akemi reached into her shield and pulled out a desert eagle.

A shot rang out, and Sayaka's sword bucked to the side as the bullet hit the blade. Sayaka tried to shift into a tackle, but Akemi was already ahead of her. Sayaka's breath rushed out of her as she barreled into Akemi's bony shoulder and rebounded off. The clockwork shield chattered and spun again, and Akemi flickered out of sight while Sayaka was still reeling. Then something hit her from behind, and Sayaka found herself thrown face first to the ground with the force of the collision.

A weight pinned her from above, small and slight, but twisting around her and yanking her limbs into unusable positions. One arm was pinned against her waist, the other pulled tight to almost breaking, and Akemi's legs tangled with hers. "This serves no purpose, Miki." Akemi spoke right into her ear, breath hot on her neck. "You can't beat me as you are. You can't even force me to use more than my shield and puella magi powers."

Sayaka threw her head back and felt a satisfying crunch and a spray of hot blood.

"Really, Miki? Very well, then." Annoyingly, she didn't even sound like she'd just had her nose broken.

A ring of Clara dolls stepped into existence around them, though Sayaka could only see their lower bodies with her head against the ground like this. The hafts of their sleek black spears lifted, rising out of sight, and she waited for the blow. But it didn't come, or at least not where she expected it. The spears plunged down around the two of them, crisscrossed over their bodies. The spears interlocked into a cone-shaped cage around them, with a Clara doll holding each spear securely down. The weight of the prison pressed down on Sayaka, added to Akemi's own, making leverage or movement nearly impossible.

She tried anyway, but barely managed an angry writhing. The weight all across her body was too much, and Akemi was still grappling her from behind, too close and too tight.

"I know, Miki, I _understand_. You hate him. You may not even know why, but I left you with that feeling still in your heart. I know, I hate him too. Look, Miki. Stop fighting me and _look_!"

One more Clara doll walked outside the ring of spears, bone-white zigzags along the hem of her long dress. An Incubator landed at her feet, dropped from her arms just outside the ring in front of Sayaka's face, and she found herself staring despite herself.

It landed like a ragdoll on its back, limbs splayed in all directions and head twisted at an unnatural angle. It made no attempt at righting itself, or even seemed aware of its position. But it was clearly alive, taking shallow breaths and shuddering in agony. Its eyes trembled unfocused, staring off at Sayaka's left without seeing.

"I'm not 'cooperating' with the Incubator, Miki. I've leashed it, chained it to my will. Does it look like a threat as it is? Look at its agony, Sayaka. Doesn't it please you? Don't you feel glee to see it suffering like this?"

She did. Sick pleasure and a sense of satisfied vengeance twisted in her chest at seeing the Incubator wheezing and tortured. "What… what happened to it?"

"It was always so eager to collect our grief for its own purposes. How many times has a young girl begged it for explanations, for some reason that would make sense of the agony it put them through? How many girls has it looked at across the worlds and across time and told them about entropy and how their pain was serving to provide _energy_ for its own survival? How many girls, Sayaka, just wanted to know why they had to suffer, and were given nonsensical reasons about things that had nothing to do with their broken hearts and shattered lives?"

Homura laughed silently, body shaking with mirth against Sayaka's back. "It's done. If the Incubator wants our pain so badly, then I've decided that it can have it. Grief drains from our gems to the Incubators now, and it can feel the pain of the grief when it processes it from our gems or from used grief cubes. Do you remember a time when you fell as low as you possibly could, a time when all you could remember were regret and glimmers of far-off light? That is the pain our dear friend Kyubey suffers for its wages now. Doesn't that please you, Sayaka? Won't you admit I've done something just?"

Floating entranced by music in the depths—a knight without hope—clinging to glimmers of a life of dedication. Sayaka shivered. She remembered that feeling of sinking endlessly into despair, even if she wasn't sure _when_ and _why_. It was the worst feeling she could imagine, and it was the Incubator's fault _somehow_. The pleasure and hate twisting in her gut was almost burning over as she watched the Incubator lying just beyond the spears; she trembled, wanting to weep with delirious joy, and felt a sudden surge of _gratitude_ to Homura for doing this to the betrayer.

But she remembered the towering fury at Akemi that was her very first real memory, she remembered Madoka chained, and she punched the strange emotion down back into her gut where it couldn't get loose. "Why keep it at all?" Sayaka demanded, but with shaky voice. "Why not make our grief go away?"

Homura shook her head against the back of Sayaka's neck, her hair twisting around Sayaka's face. "Grief does not simply disappear without suffering in a world of pain such as ours. That is beyond the power of even a goddess. Curses must be mended, sins must be borne, and grief must be cleansed. And why suffer it ourselves, when we have such a convenient scapegoat skilled at processing grief already at hand? Harvesting our grief was its goal all along. I'm simply forcing it to earn its own wages now."

"And who bears your sin, devil?"

"Myself, as I always have." There was note of something strange in Homura's voice that Sayaka couldn't pin down—pain or anger or fierce satisfaction—but it vanished as quickly as it appeared. "Are you going to continue being rash if I let you up now?"

"Just let me go."

The spears and the Clara dolls vanished—all but the one that brought the Incubator here. Sayaka scrambled up as soon as the girl trapping her let go and rolled off her back. Blood ran down Homura's face from her nose, and as she stood Sayaka caught glimpses of shallow wounds across her back, lines of them radiating out from the center of her back and staining her clothes crimson. Homura's stance was like she didn't feel it at all. She probably didn't; that was an easy trick for any of them.

Sayaka ran her hands over herself as if checking to make sure Akemi hadn't done anything to her; she knew it was stupid, but she felt dirty after having the devil wrapped around her and breathing in her ear. The last Clara doll, with short choppy blonde hair and a veiled hat fit for a stroll in the park over its dreary sundress, picked the broken Incubator body up. She held it like a precious pet, cradling it in her arms and stroking its fur even as she grinned like a happy idiot at the farcical display she was putting on. The Incubator still gave no sign it even knew what was happening; its head flopped loosely over the Clara doll's elbow.

Looking back at the blood across Akemi's face, Sayaka suddenly became very aware that she hadn't taken any damage worse than a shoulder to the stomach during the whole exchange; Akemi hadn't even tried to hurt her, even though her nose was dripping and her back covered in shallow cuts. She almost offered to heal her enemy's wounds. Almost. Instead she said, "Kyubey's suffering. _Good._ But not all its bodies are useless like this, and it still can't be trusted."

"Which is why no one here is trusting it. I will know if it disobeys me in anything. I told you, I have it leashed, and am very much enjoying that fact. Don't speak to the functional Incubators if you fear them that badly. Simply leave them to me."

"I don't trust you, either."

"Noroma, come here." The Clara doll bounded over to Akemi, eager to follow orders, and her owner wrapped her arms around her from behind and rested her head atop her minion's. "Is my world really so bad, Miki? The Incubator is chained. Madoka is safe. You can be with Sakura here as well."

"You stay away from Kyouko!"

"That wasn't a threat, Miki." A hint of long-suffering annoyance crept into Homura's expression. "I have no reason to separate you. Only here in my world can you finally be at each other's side. You two were drawn together, over and over, but failed almost as often. Can you be sure you would still have this happy arrangement if you pulled me down from my throne? Hate me all you want, despise me for my sins, but consider your circumstances carefully."

A world washed out of color, a washed out first meeting, a washed out camaraderie, all of it one more lie—Sayaka's blood ran cold as she glared at the devil's grinning face. She wanted to ram a sword through her, start another fight and force her to stop lying about Kyouko. Fuck, she _hoped_ it was a lie. She held the anger back, but couldn't think of anything else to say.

Until her and Homura's heads both snapped in the same direction as they felt a sudden swarm of wraiths rising from the city. Kyouko's mental voice came to her. _'Sayaka! Something's wrong with Madoka! Get the hell over here!'_

And Akemi was right there, her shielded arm reaching out to her. "Take my hand, Miki," she said, and then huffed in annoyance at Sayaka's expression of horrified disgust. "I can get you there faster, or I can beat you there and wrap matters up on my own. Your choice."

She only hesitated an instant, angrily wondering why Akemi would give her the chance at all. But Madoka needed her _now_. She grabbed the hand, and Akemi cranked her shield.

OoOoO

Kyouko stood in the road in front of Madoka's house and reached out. Madoka was in there, a weak shadow of a magical presence she would've completely missed if she hadn't already met the girl and gotten a good look up close. Not much magic at all, but maybe enough for this. She pushed out toward Madoka's presence with her mind.

 _'The aliens are watching you. They always have and always will. They're looking for their long lost princess's best friend's roommate, but you'll do instead. The government is putting mind control drugs in your water supply to make you forget about the magic dancers who hide bodies in their spare time. Look at that, pink one, you went crazy from the stress. Maybe you should relax by taking Kyouko out for ramen.'_

She gave it a count to five before sending a second message.

 _'Nah, I'm messing with you, we totally get telepathy with the love and justice package. You probably have just enough magic to pull it off, just try to think back at me real loud.'_

After a moment she felt the thin and fumbling reply. _'Kyouko?'_

 _'Hey, picked that up fast, didn't you?'_

 _'You scared me! And now Tatsuya's looking at me funny because I jumped so high!'_

Kyouko snorted, and wished she'd tried this where she could watch Madoka freak out. _'Oh no, funny looks, what'll we ever do? Shit came up and I'm Sayaka's stand in today, come on out and we can talk.'_

 _'Oh. You could come in instead if you like?'_

 _'Remember you made that crack about your mom would like me? I'm not going near your family til I figure out what you meant.'_

 _'Silly, I could just tell her you're staying with Sayaka and you'd be fine.'_

 _'What's that got to do with anything?'_

Madoka's laughter bubbled along down the connection. Her telepathy was already much stronger and steadier than when she'd started. _'Give me a minute to tell my parents I'm meeting a classmate and I'll be right out!'_

OoOoO

They headed for the nearest park to have someplace to talk. There were a few kids running around, but mostly they had it to themselves. Kyouko took one look at the playground and charged over to the monkey bars. Madoka sat on the edge of the platform next to them, looking up. She still couldn't get over how graceful her friends seemed. She remembered Homura balancing perfectly on the spinny thing the other day, and now Kyouko was walking easily across the _top_ of the bars while barely paying attention. There were kids stopping to stare.

"So, um…" Madoka began. "So what happened to Sayaka?"

"I don't even know what's up, but she's majorly pissed about something Kyubey did. She's off cooling her head. Oh, Kyubey's that Incubator Sayaka told you about. Little bunnycat thing."

"Oh! Where is she? I should go see her!"

Kyouko dropped between two bars, caught herself, and started doing pull-ups. "Nah, she already threw me out with instructions to stick to you, so just leave her for now. We can drill her when she's mellowed out."

"But…"

"I know, I know. Just trust me, it's better to wait on this one. She'll just clam up right now." At the top of her last pull-up, Kyouko spun upside down and hooked her legs around a bar, letting her body hang down. She gave Madoka an upside-down grin, enormous trail of hair falling around her face. "Sayaka said you got questions, so spill."

Madoka shook her head in wonder. "How do you do it? How do you stay so… so happy and carefree? You're out there fighting m-monsters and risking your life every day but you still go to school and get excited about strawberry cake and…" She waved to Kyouko hanging upside-down, "And play on monkey bars just because they're there, and how do you do that?"

Kyouko blinked, like that wasn't at all the sort of question she expected. "What else am I gonna do, hyperventilate into a paper bag all day? You ever hear anyone say 'the only way out is through'? It's like that. You just keep your eye on what's in front of you and kill it if it needs killing. Don't worry about the rest."

"That… that sounds so strange."

"I dunno, maybe it's one of those things you gotta live through to get. You find out what starving is like, and you'll be happy with a full stomach. You almost get yourself killed fighting monsters a few times, and suddenly sitting around playing video games is the best thing in the world."

"I don't think I could ever be that strong." Madoka pulled her dangling legs up and hugged them. "Running from those wraiths was terrifying. I couldn't ever go back to pretending everything was alright if I had to fight those over and over and over."

"Meh, you get used to the fighting." Kyouko flipped herself right-side up, swung to the end, and dropped down onto the platform next to Madoka. "And don't sell yourself short, Pigtails. You handled yourself pretty good against those wraiths. You've got a level head on you."

"B-but all I could do was run away!"

Kyouko scoffed. "Big soul-eating monsters like that coming at you straight out of some anime, and you didn't panic, you got out of there, stayed ahead of them, made them chase you down. We felt them hunting when we were charging over to save you, I know exactly how long you held out. Most people just go to pieces first time they're in real danger, magical demons or not."

"But, but I still would have died if Sayaka and Homura hadn't shown up right when they did!"

"Yeah, 'cause you're a squishy little human they eat for breakfast. Just take a damn compliment, will you? Wraiths that aggressive, most people wouldn't last anywhere near as long as you did. But keeping your head like that, you'd take them apart if you were puella magi." Kyouko grinned and punched her shoulder lightly. "Hell, if you had more magic and a legit reason to make a wish, I wouldn't mind having you at my back in a fight."

Madoka shook her head, holding back the beginning of tears. "Somehow, that makes it even worse. If you think I'd be a good puella magi… but all I can do is stand aside and watch. Isn't there anything I can do? Is there…" She rubbed her hand across her eyes and leaned forward, pleading. "Kyouko, you said I don't have enough potential to make a contract. Is there a way to train magic?"

Kyouko smacked her upside the head and shot her a glare for good measure. "Bad Pinkie."

"Ow! Hey!"

"I told you, Pigtails, you're better off not getting dragged into this. You've got a good life, don't chuck it aside."

"But my friends are already involved, how can I not be? I'm worried about all of you!"

"Well you can't train magic if you're just a potential, leastways not that I've heard of, so there's no point in getting worked up anyway."

"What if there were?" Madoka grabbed Kyouko's shoulders and didn't let her look away. "If I wanted to help Sayaka, would you really stop me from making a wish? Or pretend you had a second wish, but you could stop living like this if you didn't use it? Wouldn't you want to help her anyway?"

"That's… that's different! You don't ditch the people who got your back, okay?"

"It isn't different, it isn't different at all! Even if I just met you and Homura, Sayaka is my oldest friend, how am I supposed to leave her on her own?"

"Look, one day Sayaka and me are gonna die together…" The look Madoka gave her was absolutely horrified, and Kyouko realized maybe wasn't the best way to say that. "I mean… aw jeez, that's not what I meant, don't start crying on me, Pigtails, I didn't mean to freak you out."

"Then wh-what did you m-mean?" Her breath was hitching and her eyes were shining as she looked at Kyouko. "Kyouko?"

Her tongue stuck in her mouth for a long minute, but there was no other way about it. Kyouko ran her hand through her hair and wished she didn't have to ram this home for Madoka. "Actually, that really is how it is. We don't last. If we're lucky, we find something worth living for. Better yet, we find someone, throw our backs against each other. We last as long as we can and swear we'll live forever. But we all die in the end. We don't last, we just go down swinging and live good right now. You shouldn't need to get sucked into that."

"Th-that isn't right." Madoka really was crying now, slow silent tears trickling down her cheeks.

"Yeah. It's not. But that's how it is for us."

Madoka hugged herself, trying to quell her shaking. "No one should have to die thinking it was all pointless. They should always have something to hope for. And what about the girls who never found someone like you and Sayaka did? What about someone like Homura? None of us should ever die alone. There… there should be someone to meet them, someone to tell them they did well and take them home."

Kyouko felt like she ought to hug the poor kid. Madoka hunched over, shaking harder every second, and then Kyouko felt like she ought to grab her to stop her from falling off the edge of the platform. She nabbed Madoka just before she pitched off the edge and pulled her close. "There… there should be… someone." This wasn't just hard crying, Madoka was having some kind of seizure. She whimpered against Kyouko's body. "Kyouko. Kyouko? It hurts, Kyouko."

Why didn't Blue tell her Pigtails had a condition? No, not the fucking time. Get her off the playground, get her somewhere she can't fall. Kyouko stood up and took Madoka with her, not caring who saw her moving at an inhuman dash while carrying another girl like she weighed as much as a doll. She needed soft, someplace Madoka couldn't hurt herself as much. She ran for a thick patch of grass.

"Kyouko, what happened to me? Why does it hurt?" Madoka's voice was distant, like she was speaking from somewhere else instead of right there next to Kyouko in the park.

Kyouko laid her down in the softest patch of grass, then hesitated while she watched Madoka's violent shaking. She couldn't remember what you were supposed to do with someone having a fit. Hold them down, or stay clear? But if it was stay clear, was that for their safety or yours? Kyouko smacked her head. Was she magic or wasn't she? Her healing didn't scratch Sayaka's mojo, but it was better than nothing. She put one hand on Madoka's chest, above her heart, and reached out.

Healing magic always felt weird. She could feel the muscle and bone and organs and other tissues, all knotting together in ways far too tangled to follow properly, but it wasn't just like looking at a machine's innards. Actually healing damage didn't have anything to do with knowing how to put the pieces back together right. You could feel the pieces, sure, but you were also doing what Kyouko could only describe as asking the body and spirit if it was okay, and nudging it back into the shape it already knew it was supposed to be.

The pulse of her magic raced through Madoka, and couldn't find anything wrong with her body. Wasn't a seizure your brain messing its signals up? But nothing was wrong there. She dove deeper, looking beyond the brain, beyond the heart, beyond the body itself. She kept going deeper, plunging her awareness all the way down to the soul.

Madoka's spirit felt like plunging into molten gold, a vast glory burning as it pressed in around her, too much to bear. How? Wasn't Madoka's magic weak? Where did this celestial flame come from? Kyouko grit herself and pressed deeper, the light and heat of Madoka's spirit pressing in from every side as if to suffuse her. And at the heart of it all, at the core of Madoka's being...

 _something cracked_

Kyouko reeled back, mind screaming at the _brokenness_ buried inside Madoka, distantly aware that she'd fallen to the ground. Something was very wrong with the spirit of the girl writhing in front of her. Something was shattered in there.

"Holding me… something holding me apart," Madoka whined.

Kyouko pushed herself back up from the grass, and stopped dead in place. There was magic _everywhere_ , pushing down over the park like a physical weight, tasting to her extra senses like the heat of molten gold. It felt like the crack in Madoka's soul.

And she could feel the miasma banks flowing toward her position from the city around the park.

Hell if she knew what was going on. But she bound Madoka's arms and legs in chains, as tightly as she dared in hopes it would keep her from knocking about, and picked the shaking girl up. "Sorry, Pigtails, but we've gotta move."

OoOoO

The only sounds in the unnaturally still world were their feet as they landed and jumped, their breath, and the whipping of the rope tying them together. As they jumped from building to building, cars sat still in the streets below them and birds hung mid-wing. Sayaka couldn't help but look at the washed-out colors of this world between moments and shudder as she remembered the same desolate feeling from the devil's memories forced into her mind.

The miasma wasn't hard to find. Even in the frozen world, the feeling of its hunger and rage filled the air. The dark mist crouched over a park not far from Madoka's home and the thicker city district nearby, straddling the road between them and seeping into both. It was already swollen to the size of several city blocks, and still expanding fast from the way the frozen mists arced outward reaching for more. Sayaka shuddered as she guessed at how large it would be and how many wraiths would be hunting within it if they hadn't used Akemi's little cheat to get here faster. She would do whatever she had to, but fighting a whole army of the filthy monsters wasn't an inviting idea.

The mists at the edge writhed as they pushed through to the false world within, suddenly animated at their touch and grasping for them as if afraid to be still and lifeless again. They found Kyouko almost at the edge of the park, frozen midair just off the ground at the very end of a jump. Madoka, face locked in pain and limbs tied with chains, laid secure in her arms. Magic like molten gold, precious and searing, beat against them.

Behind her, a swarm of at least three dozen wraiths gave chase, fanned out in a half-circle and the nearest maybe twenty feet back. Out of physical reach, but more than close enough for their magic blasts to be a problem. It was strange. If she'd seen a crowd of wraiths like this at any other time, Sayaka would grit her teeth, bring out her two-handed sword, start screaming for Kyouko, and pray. But like this, it was impossible to be afraid of them. Even with malevolent magic coming off them, it was hard to think of them as a threat while they were frozen. More like a hideous art installation. Nowhere near as terrifying as the vast dead emptiness of Akemi's frozen time.

"I once said something to her about leaving unnecessary baggage while fighting," Akemi mused, leaning in to peer at Kyouko's gritted face. "I'm rather glad she didn't this time."

"Well?" Sayaka asked. "It's your messed-up frozen world, how do we do this?"

"Touch them and they'll join us. Best to catch Sakura, if you can do it without jostling Madoka. Otherwise she'll just keep running and freeze again before her understanding catches up with her reflexes."

Sayaka positioned herself in front of the aerial pair and reached out to touch Kyouko's arm. Relief swept through her as color swept Kyouko and Madoka, driving out that damn gray. Sayaka caught them both and half-backpedaled half-slid, draining off the impact.

Thankfully, Kyouko recognized who caught her before she got over the shock of being suddenly plucked from the air. "Sayaka? How did you get…" She looked around the frozen world, eyes widening, and settled on Akemi and her still quietly chattering shield. "That trick's kind of fucking terrifying. Just so's you know."

"We're moving away from the wraiths," Akemi said, no room for distractions or disagreement. "Bring her quickly."

Kyouko took a fast look at Sayaka to gauge how she was handling working with her hated enemy, got a nod in return. Neither of them argued with the order. Madoka was shaking hard in Kyouko's arms, who would probably have bruises or worse from flying elbows, but her guard ran on without caring, Sayaka's hand on her shoulder to keep her in the stopped world.

Akemi pulled up short as soon as they were outside the wraith's accurate blasting range. "Set her down and move away," she ordered.

"What? Leave her?" Kyouko asked.

"To keep her safe while we deal with the wraiths. It'll be as though no time passed for her. She's in unnecessary pain every second you keep her here. _Hurry!_ "

"Okay, fine, sheesh." Kyouko grumbled under Akemi's suddenly intense glare and set Madoka down on the grass as gently as she could. Color and motion leeched away from the thrashing girl immediately. "So now what, do wraiths get yanked in here too if we stick somethin' sharp 'n' pointy through 'em?"

"That won't be necessary." The rope tying Sayaka and Akemi tightened as the latter walked toward the swarm of wraiths—which were now facing the wrong direction after the puella magi moved—and raised her left arm with the bucker shield and its twisted clockworks. Her black bow set with purple gems appeared in her hand; her magical presence surged.

Sayaka opened herself to it, wanting to get a better feel for that power. It was strong, stronger even than Tomoe's, and she didn't think Akemi was even tapping into the _other_ magic that felt like black feathers, the power of a devil. What she used now was overwhelming enough on its own. Rusty metal gears grinding onward endlessly on a path that stretched from horizon to horizon, a machine held together by momentum as much as anything. Dark wine swishing about her heart, reeling and drunk on pain and pleasure. Sayaka flinched away.

Akemi drew the bowstring and aimed above the wraiths rather than at them, and a single arrow of purple light sprang into existence ready to be loosed. A wreath of purple power crackled around it, a corona of magic so strong the world seemed dimmer by comparison. Sayaka heard Kyouko hiss in surprise.

The arrow flew. It tore into the sky screaming retribution and exploded in a torrent. Lines of light spread across the ceiling of miasma above the wraiths, twisting and curving upon themselves in patterns that Sayaka's eye couldn't follow. Familiar, almost painfully so. She'd seen this before, but couldn't remember feeling scared or hateful about it. But why? The idea of facing the devil while this much power was getting thrown around was grim; if she'd seen her enemy do this before, why didn't it call up that feeling?

Heartbeats later, the lines and patterns broke and fell to the earth again. Shards of purple magic streaked down, lighting the sky like the sun shining through a stream of rain. The arrows struck, and the rolling thunder of their explosion broke over the wraiths.

The bow vanished again from Akemi's hands, and her arms slowly fell. She drew the fingers of her right hand through her hair, carelessly shaking it loose into ripples. Kyouko recovered her voice before Sayaka did. "Jesus _fuck_. I knew you were strong, but the hell was that?"

The victorious girl slowly turned toward them, smirk playing about her face, and Sayaka realized she had that desert eagle out again. Before Sayaka could do anything but fall into a guard or Kyouko could do anything at all, Akemi yanked taut the rope binding her and Sayaka together and severed it with a shot. Sayaka rushed forward on instinct with a wordless snarl to stop whatever the devil was doing, but she already knew it was too—

—late. She slid through the space Akemi had just been in. The world was in color again. Kyouko muttered "The hell?" off to her side. She spun around, sword still up, and spotted Akemi where they'd left Madoka. She was kneeling, and Madoka—no longer shaking—had her head in Akemi's lap.

"What did you do to her?" Sayaka demanded, taking several steps forward with her sword up.

"I only helped her calm down a little. Surely you can't object to that, can you, Miki?"

Madoka did look better. Her breathing was a little labored and her eyes fluttered as if she wasn't entirely awake, but she was resting. The sense of molten gold pressing down on them had vanished. One of Akemi's hands cupped the side of Madoka's face, one of Madoka's hands curled around Akemi's other. Sayaka glanced over to Kyouko, half expecting her friend to jump down her throat for being so aggressive with Akemi. Instead, her partner was watching the two girls recovering on the ground with a shrewd but otherwise unreadable face.

"You're hurt, Homura." Madoka reached for Akemi's face and the line of blood trailing from her nose, but her hand drifted unsteadily off to the side a bit.

"Just a bit of sparring. Nothing to worry yourself over." Akemi barely seemed to care what Madoka was saying, instead just smiling down at her as she came to.

"No you weren't. Don't lie to me like that, Homura!" Looking around, it suddenly seemed to strike Madoka what position she was in and what her head was resting on, and a crimson blush spilled over her face. Or was that the flush of anger? She pulled away from Akemi, failing to rise the first time before lurching to her feet. She stumbled, and Sayaka moved to catch her, but Madoka jerked back. "You two were fighting, weren't you? Why? Why would you do that? Don't you understand?" She shook her head, whether to clear it or in disbelief Sayaka couldn't say. "There were wraiths after me again, weren't there? And you two were off fighting each other! There are wraiths out there hunting people every day and you're going to waste time hurting each other?"

Madoka swayed on her feet and almost fell over again; Kyouko darted forward and caught her. Apparently Madoka was happier being caught by the one puella magi who hadn't been sniping at someone else every chance she got, because she leaned in and clung to Kyouko even as she turned back to glare watery-eyed at Akemi and Sayaka again, eyes sharpening with increasing clarity and focus.

"Why would you do that? Stop it! I... I..." Madoka took a deep breath to brace herself. "I'm not going to let you two do this anymore! I don't know why you two are like this, but I don't care anymore! Unless you two can look me in the eye and tell me whatever you two did to each other is so bad and so terrible that you can never ever be in the same room without fighting again, then you're going to stop this right now! And if you do tell me that, then… then I'll never forgive either you!"

Madoka looked from one to the other, daring them to argue with her even as her entire body trembled. Sayaka didn't meet her eye. Akemi's smug smile had fallen off entirely, and there was something stricken hiding behind her grim face. Neither of them opened their mouths.

"Good! Then it's done! You have wraiths to fight, you can't stand here tearing at each other's throats! Because… because if you do…" Madoka's hands were shaking, her voice breaking up. "If any of you died because you wouldn't help each other when you needed to and… and all I could do was sit there and watch, I… I…"

Madoka hid her face against Kyouko, very obviously trying not to cry. Sayaka blew a frustrated breath out through her nose and stepped closer to Madoka, one hand up. "Are you hurting at all? I can heal it."

Hair turned, and one pink eye regarded her from the side. "H-Homura first."

A protest died on Sayaka's lips. Not only was Madoka more likely to deck someone in the face right now than she'd probably ever been before, but Akemi had gotten them here and helped, hadn't she? Sayaka still wanted to know what Akemi did when it was just her and Madoka in timestop. She didn't trust the devil to do _anything_ with Madoka, let alone whatever she might do with magic on top of that. But at least Madoka wasn't shaking herself to pieces anymore, was she?

Not entirely reluctantly, Sayaka walked over to Akemi and healed the broken nose with a touch. She got the spear wounds on Akemi's back while she was at it; those weren't Sayaka's fault at all, but good luck trying to explain it to Madoka anyway. Akemi and Sayaka were both lucky the tiny pink tyrant hadn't properly seen Akemi's back. Surprisingly, Akemi didn't look smug and superior about Sayaka being forced to offer healing; she was still grim.

 _'Next time I come after you, I won't be off-balance. It'll be with a clear head,'_ Sayaka promised in the private silence of their minds.

Akemi pulled her baleful gaze away from Madoka. Grim violet eyes met Sayaka's blue, just as hard. _'I'll accept nothing less, Miki.'_

Madoka let Sayaka heal her after. Her muscles were bruised and torn throughout most of her body from thrashing around. She stayed burrowed into Kyouko like a blanket the whole time, but gasped in gentle surprise at the clean feeling of the healing magic trickling through her.

"Thank you," Madoka said, tiny voice lost against the larger girl she clung to. "Kyouko? Could we go now?"

Kyouko looked with worry at Sayaka, glancing at Akemi briefly. "Sayaka…"

"Go on, take care of her. No more stupid shit today for little old me, I promise!"

Kyouko didn't seem reassured by the flippant tone, but just huffed and juggled Madoka to the side so she could drag Sayaka into a fast one-armed hug. "Blue, for God's sake…"

"I'm going straight home. Honest, I've had my fill today." Sayaka pulled away, waved once, and immediately began striding off.

"See you around, Akemi," Kyouko called out. "Work with you again soon?" If Homura heard, she didn't acknowledge. She was still mostly watching Madoka, looking worried.

Well fine then. Kyouko was worried too. She was worried about what the hell was wrong with Sayaka, she was worried what the hell was wrong with Madoka that her soul was cracked and pulling wraiths _again_ , and she was worried what the hell Homura had to do with any of it. Homura clearly knew _something_ and used it to cool Madoka down back there, and Kyouko didn't know what that something was. Could be she was helping. Could be she was the problem. All she knew was Sayaka didn't like it and Kyubey claimed Homura knew Sayaka's problem.

Not getting an answer, she kept an arm around Madoka and started walking. Homura silently watched them like a graveyard. "They're going to hate me now, aren't they?" Madoka asked. She was out of danger of crying anytime soon, but still sounded miserable.

Kyouko couldn't help chuckling a little anyway. "Now don't let on you're thinking like that. Make the idiots come scraping up on their knees to you to say they're sorry first. I'll give you this, Pinkie, you look like marshmallows but you've got guts under all the poof. You did good."

"But I yelled at them… I never act like that. But… but they're making everything harder for themselves and I'm so worried about both of them and I can't do anything at all!"

"You did more than you think. The power of guilt compels them, 'n all that." Madoka didn't look much consoled. "Hey, let's go out for ramen or something, how 'bout that? Wouldn't want your family to think I just ditched you on your own like this, after all."

"I'd like that. Thank you, Kyouko."

OoOoO

Kyouko remembered when she realized that she had changed her mind.

She'd been living at the Miki house for a month when Sayaka told her that precious Kyousuke was going to be in a concert of outstanding youth talent and the whole family was going. Kyouko tried to beg off, not her scene, not her place, but only halfheartedly as Sayaka included her in the word "family" and smiled at her with those eager blue eyes. So she went, out of place and uncomfortable in the dark green dress that was part of the entirely new wardrobe Sayaka's mom insisted on buying for her.

Mitakihara's concert hall reminded her of her father's church. Not in any particular concrete detail or design choice, though. The concert hall, with its polished wood, austere red curtains, and careful illumination was almost minimalist compared to Sakura church. It was nothing like the endless array of stain glass windows in every color catching the sunlight. The concert hall was a serious place for serious people to dissect an aesthetic experience; Sakura church was a place for yearning hearts to reach above for glory. But for their differences, they still shared a certain grand stateliness, and they could both go straight to hell.

Kyouko clenched her teeth as she sat in the dark. Violinboy was up on stage with a few others as a quartet, playing… she didn't know. Something. She hadn't tried following along in the program. Something metronomic, precisely timed, and intricate. She wondered what they'd do if a wraith barreled through the side of the hall and started eating people? Probably keep playing.

Shizuki Hitomi was up there somewhere near the front, free tickets to prime seats for violinboy's dutiful girlfriend. Sayaka's mom bought _their_ tickets like the normal plebeians. Kyouko met Hitomi at school, had to put up with her now and then because they both knew Sayaka. Not too often, since Sayaka didn't try to butt her way in between her and violinboy so much these days, but still often enough to know that she was the sort of polite, well-cultured waste of space Kyouko didn't want anything to do with. The Miki party ran into her and her equally worthless rich parents on their way into the concert; Kyouko just sort of glared while Sayaka handled the pleasantries.

And Sayaka, in the seat next to Kyouko. Sayaka, eating up every note and every chord with the kind of worshipful awe that comes only to those who believe in something bigger and grander than them. Kyouko should know, she saw it on her father's face every time he got up to preach. Before she kicked it all over and made it a lie, anyway. Sayaka had something extra besides the worship, though. Even in the dim auditorium lighting, she can see Sayaka shuddering, see her pressing a handkerchief over her mouth to muffle her shaky breath. If she asked, Sayaka would lie and say the music moved her.

Kyouko shoved up out of her seat with a muttered maybe-apology and forced her way toward the end of the row. Violinboy's music chased her to the exit and out the hall.

She should just ditch and head back home, wait out the concert. Hell, she should forget this whole thing staying with some idiot and head back to her _real_ home at the church, the burnt-out wreckage of the life she already screwed up. Why stick around to watch another spectacular disaster? Sayaka wanted her to sit through a concert? Then Sayaka could chase her down and drag her back.

But she set up on a posh bench near the restrooms in the lobby anyway, feet up on the cushion and grinding a stick of pocky between her teeth like it was personally responsible for this whole evening. A stiff, white-haired usher looked ready to scold her ears off, but one veiled death threat delivered by glare kept him busy elsewhere. She could still hear violinboy's music, piped into the lobby by sound system for the benefit of stragglers. Even out here she had to sit through that crap.

Applause came from hall a few minutes later, and that was when Sayaka found her.

"So you come to yell at me for leaving in the middle, or for eating on their furniture?" Kyouko asked. Flippant, light. Forcibly uncaring.

"It's me, you know," Sayaka said, standing a little ways apart. "Remember, I fixed your leg after you broke it kicking a wraith's head in last week? Girl you work with?"

"Only broke it 'cause you needed your ass rescued," Kyouko reminded her.

Sayaka sat on the bench by Kyouko's legs. "Talk to me, will you? What was that all about?"

"I just… why won't you stop putting yourself through this shit?" Kyouko thumped a fist into the cushion. "You made a stupid wish and it bit you in the ass. Either go grab that idiot Kamijou of yours or forget about it and leave him alone. Don't just stand there at the edge looking in on both of them. She won, you didn't, either get out of the way or go punch her face in and take him anyway! Don't… don't just…" Kyouko hit the wall this time; something cracked. "Don't just stand there looking pathetic, Blue! I hate it."

"A stupid wish?" Sayaka looked up, tilting her head toward the sound of the string quartet coming over the speakers once again. "I guess I did. I realized that pretty soon on my own."

"So forget about him," Kyouko pleaded. "Just stop beating yourself up and stick with me instead."

"I have given up on him. I wouldn't be able to sit there and listen to his music if I hadn't. I healed his hand and made him play again, but I really was thinking 'so Kyousuke will love me in return' when I made that wish." Sayaka shook her head and smiled at Kyouko. It wasn't her usual happy-go-lucky mask she hid behind far too often, though. It was a smile that didn't try to hide her regret, only live with it. "That was why it was a stupid wish, because I was lying to myself, not because I spent it on someone else. But I really do love his music. It's exactly what I wished for, so I'll cherish it."

Sayaka laughed, and went on. "And the rest? I don't want to be someone who does the right thing because I expect rewards. You said it, the world doesn't work that way, and I shouldn't ever expect it to. But I'm not going to get bent out of shape over it, either. What I want isn't important in this world. All I can hope for is to do the right thing as long as I can."

"You have to take _something_ ," Kyouko insisted. "You'll starve if you don't."

"Maybe. I'll take what I'm given, I guess." Sayaka's gaze drifted back to the speakers. "Not from him though, except listening to his music."

They sat not speaking for a moment, listening to the music from the speakers. It began quiet and careful, then built to a cheerful lilt and swirled about like it had travelled the world and never found anything to be angry about. On an impulse, suddenly wanting to share in whatever Sayaka saw in violinboy's crap, Kyouko asked, "Hey, what is this anyway?"

"A waltz. 'The Blue Danube,' arranged for string quartet. It's better with a full symphony."

"That's the three-four dance stuff isn't it?"

"Uh huh."

Kyouko slid off the bench and held out a hand. "Come on, then." Sayaka blinked at her in confusion. Kyouko grinned. "They made us learn waltzing back in grade school, I think I remember how it goes. Hell, you can probably teach me if I don't. You gotta dance if there's dance music, right? No damn point sitting around moping. Have some fun, Blue."

With a growing smile, Sayaka took the offered hand and let Kyouko pull her to her feet, and they began to dance in the lobby. They fumbled around at first over who was leading, working out whose hands went where and fighting over which direction to move. They weren't exactly feeling the upbeat, cheerful tune at first, either: Kyouko was still angry, Sayaka's mind still on Kyousuke. But bit by bit they taught each other the steps, and all that fell away. Bit by bit, they felt each other out and practiced moving together. Bit by bit, they turned toward one another and brought each other around.

OoOoO

Kyouko slurped her ramen with noisy satisfaction. Breaded pork strips and noodles in a miso broth. Madoka was tired and far from happy, but the wake of her… fit? outburst? ... had at least left her placid. She ate her boiled egg ramen with much better table manners. They hadn't said much since they left Sayaka and Homura in the park, letting silence and simple food put their worries out of mind instead.

"She saved my soul," Kyouko said. She raised the finger that wore her soul gem as a ring. "And I'm not talking 'bout this shiny thing. Sayaka and me, we ran into each other when I was finally sick of being on my own with nothing to believe in. I thought I was better off on my own looking out for just myself, and everyone I gave damn about was better off without me. Got real sick of that. So, I owe her my soul. That's what I was tryin' to say earlier."

Madoka paused to listen, chopsticks with noodles halfway to her mouth. She didn't ask where this came from, she didn't ask why Kyouko was telling her this. She didn't ask how far Kyouko's belief went, whether she was only watching her friend's back or whether she was trying to stand up for something as far-reaching as Sayaka's justice. She just listened, watched, and nodded once. She just accepted that this was Kyouko.

Kyouko took another slurp of her ramen and went on after swallowing. "Thing is, I think I get where Akemi is. No clue why she's so into you, but she's been through shit and done some shit, so now she figures she's gotta be a bitch and keep everyone else away. I never called her on it 'cause hey, I was the same. Then Sayaka came and kicked my walls in." Kyouko smiled at Madoka. "I figure it's time I do the same with Homura."

Madoka smiled back, pleased, and that was all that needed to be said. They went back to eating.

OoOoO

Long-trained instincts pulled Kyouko out of sleep as her door opened almost soundlessly, but she relaxed again when she recognized the light padding of bare feet across the carpet and felt magic that tasted of water seeping into the room. Murky and churning and choked with brine. Sayaka wasn't doing so good. She'd gone right home like she promised after they parted ways earlier, but spent the rest of the evening playing dumb and dodging every question Kyouko tried to put to her.

The footsteps made their way over to Kyouko's bed, and a weight pressed onto the edge of the mattress. Kyouko rolled over away from the wall and stared at the dark ceiling and waited. Sayaka's upright, pajama-clad form sat in the edge of her sight, emerging from the darkness only by catching the dim line of moonlight through the window.

After long moments, the weight on the edge of the mattress shifted as Sayaka began to stand up again. Kyouko reached out and caught her arm, stopping her. Sayaka's head swiveled around. Her face was in shadow, hiding her eyes. Kyouko desperately wanted to see their brilliant blue. If she could, she bet she'd see tear lines running down beneath them.

"What if I couldn't remember you?" Sayaka asked. Her voice was low and quiet, but that didn't hide the hoarseness lurking at the bottom of it. "What if I was crazy? Would you still watch my back?"

"Sayaka. What are you talking about?" She remembered Sayaka going berserk as soon as she saw Kyubey. Her bleak moods and broken smiles trying to hide them. The way she never seemed to want to say what was on her mind or what troubled her lately. Sayaka stayed quiet. "Hey. You're freaking me out, Blue. Talk to me, will you? I won't know what's up if you can't talk to me."

"Nothing. Never mind. I'm sorry." Sayaka tried to stand up again, but Kyouko kept her grip.

"You dragged me into your house, you're stuck with me forever," Kyouko said. "Don't go trying to ditch me now."

Kyouko tugged harder, and Sayaka let herself be pulled down to the bed. Kyouko threw the covers over both of them and wrapped her up in a hug from behind, gently rubbing Sayaka's hands with hers. Eventually the breathing of the brave idiot who took her in slowed down and her magic calmed into an ocean tide gently lapping at the shore, and Sayaka fell asleep in her arms.

It was a long time before the hot worry in Kyouko's stomach loosened enough for her to follow.

OoOoO


	5. Chapter 5

.

* * *

 **OoOoO**

 **A Curse Between Us**

 **Chapter 5**

 **OoOoO**

* * *

"I knew you'd be here, Madoka," Homura said, and reached across the table to take her hand. "Thank you for coming to such a place."

Of course she'd come. Where else would she be? Homura asked her to.

"I'm just here for the tea," Kyouko said, lounging on her right, and tossed back her cup in one gulp before teaching for the tea pot to get a refill. There was something struggling in the shadows behind Kyouko with a low, desperate heaving noise that put her on edge with worry.

Homura's hand slid gently over her face, drawing her attention back and leaving her skin tingling. "Don't mind her, Madoka. The party's all for you, after all." She was wearing her old-fashioned black dress, the one that wrapped her in beautiful sorrow from head to toe. She wanted to cry, seeing Homura looking so dreary, but the elegance of it also made her wonder what it would be like to dance with Homura across a ballroom. Homura smiled at her happily. "Would you like a drink, Madoka?" Homura lifted a cup, offering it to her.

She tried to accept it, but her hands wouldn't budge from the table. Homura shook with silent laughter and pushed the cup to her lips. Bitter, so bitter. She coughed as soon as the hot liquid hit her tongue, spraying tea everywhere.

"Don't worry about it, Madoka." Homura grabbed a silk napkin and wiped Madoka's face, ignoring the spray of tea across her own dress and hair.

The heaving off in the shadows behind Kyouko changed into a throttled wheeze.

A little girl with white hair sat at Homura's right, eyes clenched tight and hands squeezed over her mouth. Nagisa. Between her fingers, the skin of her mouth and cheeks were unmoving and made of carved wood, painted clownish white and yellow.

"You mustn't look away like that, Madoka." Homura dropped the cloth and touched her face again, but roughly, grabbing her jaw and forcing her to make eye contact. "They'll take care of themselves. There's nothing there you need to worry about. I'll have to become angry if you keep looking away. Please, Madoka?"

Tears came to Madoka's eyes as Homura kept squeezing. She tried to tell Homura it hurt, tried to ward her off, but she couldn't talk through Homura's grip and her hands still wouldn't move from the table.

"That's it, Madoka. Stay with me. I couldn't bear it if you left early. Stay and we can be happy. Stay and we'll be together. There's nothing to worry about. There's nothing to worry about at all."

The sound of choking trailed off. The only thing she heard was Kyouko slurping her tea. She jerked her head to the side, trying to see what was behind Kyouko, but Homura's grip tightened.

"I told you not to look, Madoka." Homura's voice went flat and cold. "Why won't you listen? Why isn't this good enough? What else do I have to do to make you stay?" Her hands left Madoka's face and sank to the table. Madoka thought she felt Homura take her own hands, but it felt strange, distant, as though the touch was coming through a thick layer of dirt and grime.

Pain. White-hot, stabbing its way up her arms, burning out the feeling in her hands as it climbed higher and higher. She looked down, crying out as the pain climbed up and up. First she noticed the clothes she wore weren't any from her own bedroom closet—instead, a dress of pure white glimmered softly over her frame.

And it was strange that she noticed her clothes first, because the way her hands seemed made of stone was a little more pressing.

They were fused into the table, and had been for a long time. Chips and waterwear crossed her fingers like she was an old statue. But the stone climbing up her arms, hardening the rest of her skin as it went—that was new.

Homura gazed at her, purple eyes dilating into endless pools of dark, and smiled reverently. "I'll see how well this holds you. Won't that be nice, Madoka?"

Madoka jerked awake. Just as she'd gotten used to every morning, she relaxed her muscles and waited for her heart to stop hammering. After a moment of breathing slowly, she looked over at her clock. Five minutes before her alarm went off. She got up, switched it off, and set about waking Mama up.

At the breakfast table twenty minutes later, she listened with a barely-attentive ear to her parents' idle conversation, not really following. The newscaster on one of the screens made even less sense.

She looked at the cup of amber apple juice sitting off to the side of her plate. "Papa, could I try some coffee?"

"Oh? I thought you didn't like it, sweetie."

"I don't."

Her parents exchanged a look. "Still having trouble sleeping?" Mama asked.

"It's getting better." It wasn't a lie. She was getting to sleep at night, and waking up on time. But the nightmares weren't going away at all. If anything, they were getting worse. More vivid, more intense. More intimate.

Her parents looked at each other again. They were doing that a lot around her lately. She must've been worrying them. "A little caffeine certainly won't hurt," Mama said, smiling at her as Papa poured her cup from the pot. "Don't get used to it though, young lady. Only old drunks like me should need coffee to pry their eyelids open in the morning."

"I won't," Madoka promised as her father passed her the cup.

OoOoO

"I'm actually a little nervous," Madoka admitted.

"Don't be," Kyouko said. "Loners like her smell fear from a hundred paces."

"Is that supposed to make me feel better?"

"Nah. I'm just rigging it so if she goes feral, she'll jump you while I make my getaway."

"Kyouko…"

It turned out Mami wasn't at school on Monday, which was both a disappointment and a relief to Kyouko. She wasn't in telepathy range during breaks, and when Kyouko went over to investigate in person her classmates said she'd called in sick. She was fairly certain puella magi didn't _get_ sick, least nothing their magic wouldn't easily fight off, so Mami was probably catching up on real honest-to-goodness sleep after hunting all night. Or regrowing an arm. Whichever happened first. She'd give it a day or three, see if Mami showed up again.

In the meantime, that gave Kyouko time to work on her _other_ project. Akemi Homura. The girl who needed someone to drag her head out her ass. The girl who knew what was up with Sayaka, according to Kyubey. The girl who knew something about whatever the hell was wrong with Pinkie.

Madoka didn't seem to clearly remember anything that happened to her or what she'd said during the fit, or what Homura did to calm her down. Kyouko wasn't sure why she decided not to fill her in just yet, except that she didn't even know what she knew. Hey Pinkie, you did this shaky thing and then wraiths jumped you until your goth girlfriend somehow made you not do that anymore. Also, your soul is broken. Fuck if I know how.

Yeah, maybe not. Better to keep an eye out and find out more.

"Just so you know, I ain't trying any smelly perfume, and I demand a trip to the food court somewhere in this."

"…Wasn't the mall your idea?"

"Sure, and that means I've got definite ideas what I want out of it."

More like she didn't know what else all three of them could do and tolerate. Her standbys for entertainment when there was time were eating out, arcade, bad movies, sparring with Sayaka, and getting dragged into music stores by Sayaka. She wanted something all three of them could do and actually talk during, so sparring was out because of Pigtails, movies were out because they should at least talk, and she had no idea what Homura would actually stick around for. Cute pink-haired girls, probably. She just needed to get Homura to hold still long enough to get a good read on her, make a guess or three what her trauma was, maybe get her opposite number used to the idea of hanging around people who weren't Madoka. Thus, here they were, pushing their way through the crowded mall, on their way to meet Homura.

And there she was, waiting at the water fountain they'd promised to meet at. She'd noticed them, and watched them approach with a cool gaze. Kyouko couldn't guess what she thinking, other than she wasn't happy to see Kyouko here. No prize for figuring that one out. Madoka reached over and grabbed Kyouko's hand, squeezing. Hell, Pigtails really was nervous about this, wasn't she? Her hand was shaking.

"Homura!" Madoka waved as they got closer. "I brought Kyouko along with me. I hope you don't mind."

Homura's eyes flicked over to Kyouko, down to their joined hands, back up to Madoka, all while giving not much away. Madoka was still smiling at her hopefully. "It's not a problem," Homura finally said.

"So let's hit this place," Kyouko said, grinning with a huge serving of unwarranted optimism.

It became very obvious very quickly that the three of them had hardly anything in common. Sure, Kyouko got on with Pigtails alright, more than alright even, but she hadn't known her long enough that they could just do whatever and be comfortable like with Sayaka. Add Homura in there keeping her aloof distance at all times, and things just got awkward.

The first place they hit was a clothes store, but Kyouko didn't want to spend much money there. Sayaka's mom had just bought her an entire new wardrobe, after all, and it felt wrong to go throwing fists of cash at designer clothes when she was essentially living off the Miki's charity. Like she'd even be caught dead wearing an outfit worth three months of food anyway. They mostly just watched Madoka try on cute clothes while Kyouko wolfwhistled at her for the hell of it.

Homura elected for a bookstore next, and went off on her own rifling through translations of old foreign books. The other two sort of tried to distract themselves with manga while Homura was browsing. Kyouko started to wander over to the religion section out of morbid curiosity, but immediately turned around when she spotted the exact same pocket edition of the Bible her father used to carry around to read in free moments. After twenty minutes, Homura met up with them again, carrying a small stack of books to purchase.

" _Paradise Lost_ , _Faust_ ," Kyouko read off the visible titles as Homura handed them over to the attendant at the register. "Wouldn'ta figured you for that type." Homura, otherwise impassive, arched a questioning eyebrow. Kyouko tried to explain, "I mean, you're smart and all, but you seem too practical for old poems or artsy stuff." A blank stare. "Eh, what do I know about you though, right?"

Homura didn't respond while the attendant rang up her books, took payment, and slipped the stack into a bag, and Kyouko was pretty sure she'd pissed the aloof girl off somehow or other. It was like trying to talk to a wall made out of landmines. Madoka noticed too (not that she'd been looking anywhere else while Homura and Kyouko were aimed at one another) and was starting to worry her lip. But as they left, Homura said, "I mostly am. Practical, that is. But practicality is only a means to an end, is it not? These sorts of stories remind me of my goals."

Right then. Kyouko never read either of those books, but was kind of familiar with the outline because hey, Christian upbringing. Uppity angel gets kicked out, man makes stupid deal with devil. Seems like great and healthy things to use as reminders of your purpose, right? Hell, who was she kidding, healthy had nothing to do with any of them. Faust was perfect for puella magi. Point to goth girl then, and damn them all.

The awkward melted off a little when they reached the arcade, Kyouko's pick. Attempts to lure Homura into DDR failed miserably—either she wasn't competitive or wanted to avoid flashy public displays of superhuman agility and speed. But Kyouko managed to jump into a two-person rail shooter with her, with Madoka bouncing around behind them being amazed. Homura, as it turned out, was a flawless shot with a light gun.

And when it was Madoka's turn to pick something, Kyouko found herself staring up at the store in confusion. "…Furniture?"

"Ehihi, it's kind of a hobby of mine?"

"She likes chairs," Homura said quietly. "A bit too much." Her voice was as flat as it'd been all day, but her eyes—her eyes finally showed something other than aloof distance. For just a moment, those were the eyes of a girl who had gazed into the abyss too many times and found it reaching back to drag her in. Those were the eyes of a survivor in a world gone mad. "I don't understand why."

"Alrighty then," Kyouko said, looking between Madoka and the store. Pinkie was giggling at Homura's deadpan explanation, and… blushing? Okay. Whatever. "Chairs it is, then."

"You don't understand," Homura said, the faintest hint of urgency crawling into her voice like a prophet of doom from out the wilderness. "We will be there _all day_."

"Ehihi, I don't mind if you two go do something else for awhile! We can meet up later."

"I am getting hungry," Kyouko admitted. The main food court was on other side of the building, but a quick look around showed her a taco joint nearby. "How 'bout we grab something to eat and wait out here awhile? We can come drag you out if the mall's about to close or something."

"Okay! I'll try not to be too long, I promise!" Madoka skipped into the furniture store looking a little too pleased with herself.

"I'll grab us some tacos," Kyouko told Homura when they were alone. "My treat."

"Don't bother. I'll be fine without."

"Aw, come on, a feast's no good without sharing it around! You like tacos, don't you?"

Homura didn't try to claim she didn't (because some lies are just too bald-faced to be believed), so Kyouko dashed off and came back a few minutes later with two bags full of some of everything. There had to be something in there to Homura's tastes, and there'd be leftovers for Madoka when she got back. She passed a bag to Homura and dragged her over to a bench not far from the furniture store.

Homura removed the first package she found at the top of her bag without investigating further and vaguely picked and nibbled at her meal while Kyouko began scarfing her own wholeheartedly. When Kyouko was on her third taco, Homura finally spoke up. "Tell me, Sakura. What are you trying to accomplish with this farce of yours?"

"Huh? I thought it was obvious. Wraiths are getting worse, and being at each other's throats all the time's not good for any of us." Kyouko finished off number three and started unwrapping number four. "Wouldn't it be more convenient for everyone if we can get along?"

"A simple explanation. But you're not a simple person, Sakura Kyouko, however you pretend otherwise, and these aren't simple circumstances." Homura turned a cold stare to Kyouko. "Care to try again?"

"I've been where you are now," Kyouko started, every word slow and measured, hoping that she could get across to the other girl how much she really meant it. "I've been where I thought I was better without anyone. I've been where I thought everyone I gave a damn about was better off without me. It's the sort of place that kills your soul, Homura."

"You think you understand me?" Homura lit up with twisted amusement. "You think we're the same? Don't make me laugh, Sakura. You'll never understand what I've done."

"Don't write me off so easy, Violet. I'm not just some loud brawler with a food fetish. I've got blood on my hands, I've got my share of sins. I know what it's like to suffer alone."

"I'm well aware of that, Sakura."

"Oh? Go on then, try me."

Homura's pleased smile was like the wrong end of a sniper's scope. "You made your wish in a fit of shortsightedness, playing with powers you didn't understand. You poisoned your father's mind, and he poisoned his congregation in turn."

Shock jolted through her. Homura slid closer on the bench til their hips bumped, giggling as she leaned up into Kyouko's space. "It caught you off guard, didn't it, when he decided to cleanse his family of the evil witch's influence? A fire in the church."

She'd gone sprinting right through the front doors at first, thinking her dad would be there preparing his sermon at this hour of the day, not realizing what was really happening. When she found the fire had taken the office he worked in, she charged in anyway. Stupid, reckless. But what did it matter if her skin burned off? She could bear it. She had to see if he was there.

"His body swinging adrift in your home."

She'd dashed to their cottage home on the grounds as soon as she found the church empty, burns across her skin making her look like the devil he'd called her, roasting in hell for twisting holy things. She saw it then. His polished shoes, hanging above the ground like an angel's.

Kyouko jumped as Homura trailed her fingertips across the side of her face.

"And theirs, on the ground, in pools of blood. His hand, but your fault in the end, wasn't it, dear Sakura?"

Mom. Momo. They did _nothing_! This wasn't an angel's work, it was a devil's and a witch's. Why did Mom and Momo suffer for _her_ sins?

"So you ran off in a fit of pique, to try to kill yourself slowly in the streets."

Kyouko grabbed Homura's wrist, forcing her hand away and breathing heavily. She felt bone creak under her grip, but Homura didn't react to the pain. Homura leaned in further, until her breath was tickling Kyouko's face. "Why are you here trying to push yourself on me, Sakura? You already have people like Miki who want to redeem you and people like Madoka who don't suspect how much blood is on your hands. Shouldn't you be grateful for that and not overreach yourself? We're nothing alike. You have regrets, Sakura, but I don't regret anything I've done. I don't need you to save me."

With that, Homura seemed to lose interest in her. She pulled away and went back to her side of the bench, picking up her bag of food. She carefully folded the top down and tightened it closed into a careful little package, then picked up her half-eaten taco in the other hand, looked away for a moment toward the furniture store, and held both hands out away from her body. Kyouko watched, too stunned to move, even as she realized what Homura was about to do. Homura let the bag and the taco drop, into a nearby garbage bin.

Red. _How dare she._ Copper blood, as she bit into her lips. _She knows and does it anyway!_ Fists wrapped up in Homura's shirt, lifting her off the ground. _How dare she!_ Lips curled up in mockery, uncaring of the snarling fury before her, eyes hardened by a heart that doesn't dare _feel_

"Kyouko? Homura?"

Madoka stood, maybe fifteen paces away, looking panicked at the scene before her. Kyouko couldn't explain. She was too angry. She let Homura drop and pushed past her. Homura didn't resist.

She leaned over the garbage can, looking in through blurry her vision. The bag was okay, the bag was still closed. The loose taco was a lost cause, since it was unwrapped. Shredded lettuce and spiced chicken bits and olives and diced onion and sour cream and cheese were spread out over the whole top layer of trash, thrown over empty drink cups and greasy used wrappers. She shoved her arm in up to the shoulder and lifted out Homura's bag of tacos.

She grabbed her own bag from the bench where she'd left it and shoved it into Madoka's arms as she walked by. "Eat this yourself," she said, not looking straight at her, and started unwrapping one of Homura's tacos while she walked off as fast as she could, ignoring Madoka calling her name behind her.

OoOoO

She went for the rooftops as soon as she was outside.

She needed to calm down. She needed a clear head.

Good thing she had a bag of tacos, then. She pulled one out and bit into it as soon as she found a roof far enough away she couldn't see the mall from it.

She knew _exactly_ what Homura was doing.

That didn't mean it didn't get to her, but she knew what the bastard was up to. She'd done it herself to Sayaka all the time before deciding being friends maybe wouldn't be so bad after all. Bait her, try to drive her off, give her every reason to give up and forget about helping a lost cause.

She finished her taco and tore the next one in half with a single bite. Her wish, her failure, her _family_ —but thinking about it, anyone who knew about puella magi and read the newspaper could guess as much as the bastard said once they connected her name and face to the Sakura church tragedy. It'd been plastered over everything when it happened, the sudden murder-suicide in the nation's most popular Christian church, and the eldest daughter vanished without a trace.

She knew exactly what Homura was doing, and she wasn't going to let it get to her. Sayaka didn't give up on Kyouko. 'Course, Kyouko _wanted_ help back then, and hell if Homura did now. But something was wrong with Sayaka, and something was wrong with Madoka, and Homura was going to get the help she needed so Blue and Pinkie could get the help they needed, and fuck whatever Homura thought about it. She'd just have to step things up a little.

Pinkie didn't want them fighting or hurting each other's feelings or whatever. That'd be nice, it really would. Kyouko murmured an apology to her in preemptive repentance. One way or another, this was gonna hurt.

OoOoO

"This isn't necessary."

"Of course it is! You're always off on your own unless I'm with you. You'll argue less with the others if you spend more time around them."

"We'll argue less if we're not around each other at all."

"That's a terrible solution! Besides, this is your punishment for making Kyouko mad yesterday day!"

Madoka had both her hands planted on Homura's back, trying to push the taller girl toward the door to the rooftop. For her part, Homura had a grounded stance that was barely shifting at all as the tiny pink girl continuously threw her weight against it undiscouraged.

"Madoka…"

Madoka did her best to channel her Mama's no-nonsense voice of command. "Don't sigh at me like that, Homura! You're going to keep running into Sayaka and Kyouko as long as you're all friends with me. It's best to get along with each other, isn't it?"

Madoka nudged the door open by the simple expediency of bumping Homura into the push bar, and the sun-lit rooftop opened before them. Sayaka and Kyouko were already on a bench, lunchboxes out in front of them, laughing and sparring with chopsticks and trying to steal each other's food, even though their meals were the same. When she'd asked them earlier about inviting Homura, Sayaka had… agreed, or at least accepted it with a certain amount of grace. Kyouko… Kyouko had burst out laughing, for some reason. Which was odd, because Kyouko had been mad at Homura at the mall just yesterday, but now she seemed really happy to have Homura around again.

"Hey, Pigtails and Twintails!" Kyouko waved to them, breaking off her thieving match with Sayaka. "Come sit on my side!" She scooted toward Sayaka, pushing her to the end of the bench and making room.

Madoka ran over to sit by Kyouko; thankfully, Homura stopped struggling and trailed along to take the seat on Madoka's other side. Madoka opened her lunch, humming happily. It looked like today Papa had given her rolled omelets spiced with cinnamon for her main dish, along with loose fruits and veggies and rice. She took a bite of the rice; it'd been cooked in a chicken stock for flavor, and sprinkled over the top with some hot spices.

"Why Twintails, anyway?" Sayaka asked. "Her hair isn't tied off."

"Yeah, but look near the bottom." Kyouko pointed with her chopsticks. Halfway down Homura's back, her hair split out into two lines.

"I've been wondering how you make stay like that?" Madoka asked.

"It… it just does that," Homura replied. Then, with the air of one hoping to end the conversation, she reached into her bag and pulled out two drink boxes of milk tea and several nutrient bars.

Kyouko blinked at that. "Oi. Homura. That's your lunch?"

"Yes." She stuck a straw in one box and started sucking it dry.

Madoka shook her head. "She always brings that. I keep trying to tell her even she finds some good bars that really do have enough nutrients, it's still kind of sad not to have anything tasty for lunch."

"It's sufficient," Homura said.

Madoka looked back to her own lunch and lifted the box toward Homura slightly. "I… I've decided! You keep saying you don't want any of my lunch, but it's just too sad for the rest of us to sit here eating home-cooked food while you just have those. You should really have some of my lunch, Homura!"

"No need. Besides, I don't have anything to eat with."

Stiff Homura was hard to work with. Madoka kind of wished she'd go back to being all… swaggery and flirty, like she was before Madoka yelled at her on Sunday, even if she was mean to the others sometimes. But stiff Homura also didn't put up much of a real fight, other than being stoic at her. Madoka picked up an omelet between her chopsticks and held it up, blushing a little. "Say 'ah,' Homura!"

"That isn't… you don't need to…"

Madoka kept smiling at her.

Homura sighed, also blushing, and opened her mouth with an air of defeat.

Kyouko snickered. "Never shoulda let her get away with shouting at you, Twintails. Now she knows she can bully you as much as she wants."

Homura sat there looking like she was trying to figure out where she'd lost control of her life; Madoka giggled and moved the omelet in.

And Kyouko slid around her and popped a chunk of broccoli into Homura's open mouth.

Homura immediately started coughing. "Kyouko!" Madoka scolded. "Why did you do that?"

"What? If Twintails needs some real food, it's not fair she just eat all of yours. Let's spread it around a little! Everyone contributes to the cause." Kyouko's grin was bright and innocent. At the end of the bench, Sayaka snorted into her meal.

"That's… true, I guess," Madoka said. Homura looked ready to spit the broccoli out, but took one look to confirm that Madoka was watching her and swallowed instead.

"My turn this time," Madoka said, and lifted the omelet again.

Kyouko was faster, and Homura got another chunk of broccoli. Sayaka started cackling.

"Veggies are good for you!" Kyouko declared, grinning recklessly in response to Homura's glare.

Madoka looked between them. "Um… you're acting friendly, Kyouko, but I get the feeling I'd hear you saying something mean if I could listen in on your telepathy?"

"No, course not, would I do that?" Kyouko asked, at the same time Homura hissed, " _Yes!_ "

OoOoO

"I'm so sorry Kyouko was teasing you like that at lunch, Homura." Madoka was practically walking sideways as they made their way home, facing her friend to better hover over her in ongoing and unabated worry. The awkward way of traveling meant they were moving slower and quickly left behind by the other students flooding out into the city, but no one seemed to mind or try to talk to them. Most of their classmates had accepted that Madoka had been pulled into the private little world Homura carried with her.

But she hated splitting her time like this, lunch with Homura one day, walking home with Sayaka the other, hated that everytime she put them all in the same room she basically had to play referee. She hated that even when Homura, Sayaka, and Kyouko could all be civil to each other, there was still almost a subtle competition to claim the most of Madoka's attention. There were better things to fight about! Like wraiths!

"It's fine," Homura said, seemingly unbothered by Madoka's fussing.

"No it isn't! I brought you to lunch because I want everyone to get along better!"

"Harassment is her way," Homura said with a minute toss of her head to dismiss the entire incident. That done, she settled her gaze on Madoka with not a trace of reticence and smiled in pleasure. "Besides, you were there. That's more than enough."

Ah. Yes, there it was, swaggery flirty Homura again. Hiding since Madoka shouted at everyone, sneaking out once more. Maybe because they were alone again? She felt her face getting warm, but didn't mind at all. "Ehihi, I'm not the only one you should get along with though! You'd love Kyouko and Sayaka if you spent more time with them, I'm sure of it!"

"Yes, I would." Homura reached over and caught her hand. "But I'll see them again mostly because I'll stay with you."

"Oh! I, um, but…why? I mean." So blunt! She really was overheating now. What had she ever done to deserve the kind of devotion someone as important and amazing as Homura constantly threw at her feet? She scrambled around for an answer, and found herself changing the subject. "Uh, um, Homura, you… you said we could talk about puella magi things sometime. Do you remember? When we went to the café and the park? Isn't it time we talked about that some?"

It wasn't until the other girl's hand slipped from hers that Madoka realized Homura had stopped walking.

"H-homura?"

She turned back. Homura, unmoving, stared aways above Madoka's head and into the sky. Even at their first meeting, Homura had felt so familiar, the lines of her face a book Madoka could already read. Now there was something feral and angry writhing just under the placid surface of her untouched eyes, something easily missed if you believed the composed exterior, something Madoka had glimpsed lurking in her over and over.

"I keep telling you I'm taking care of it." Calm. Distant. Disgusted. "Why won't you let it rest?"

"Because…" She took a deep breath and stepped forward. _Homura would never hurt me._ "Because I want to help you! All of you, Sayaka and Kyouko and Nagisa too. If I can find some way to be useful…"

" _Stop._ "

Madoka fell silent.

"Of course you would be difficult like this. It's in your loving nature." Still looking above Madoka rather than at her, Homura stretched out a hand and squinted into the distance as if trying to pluck something from the sky. "And I admire that frustrating part of you, Madoka. It's part of what makes you so beautiful. Even if I were to tell you over and over again that I don't need to be saved, that I want you to let me do this for you, always for you…"

Madoka, hesitant, turned to try to follow the line of Homura's reaching arm. She squinted into the sky. It was pristine blue, with only a few puffy clouds like cake frosting to decorate it. It was so perfect it could have been a painted sign at a puppet theater, but otherwise…

 _A tomb hung in the heavens, the monument to a dead goddess. She hugged herself tightly, feeling the pure white cloth draped across her. She waited, unable to reach outward. Stone pressed in over her flesh._

…otherwise she didn't see anything, though she felt a little light headed staring up above the city. She turned back. "H-Homura?"

Homura's hand fell. "Is this what the poet meant, when he said it was better to rule in hell than serve in heaven? I hoped to claim that high place and rule in heaven, but that was never an option for someone like me, was it? I thought I'd finally reached my paradise, where everything important to me would be safe and blessed and I could have you in my grasp at last, yet here you are, instinctively trying to take my throne."

This… this wasn't normal. Madoka stood rooted in place, torn once again between moving forward to take Homura in her arms and running away. "I don't understand what you're talking about. Please, try to be clearer?"

Homura's gaze snapped down from the sky, locking on Madoka. She strode forward, schoolbag dropping to the ground heedlessly, and grabbed Madoka's shoulders, who squeaked in fright. The streets were empty. Where did everyone go? There hadn't been many before, but now… "Tell me, dear one," Homura said, hands clamping down painfully, "What would you do? If you had a purpose, something so important, so sacred that you would cross heaven, earth, and hell to achieve it, but at the end of your journey you found out that the very last thing you had to sacrifice to succeed was the _one thing_ you wanted most all along? What if you had to be hated by the one who mattered most?"

"I don't understand, but…"

"Tell me." Homura's eyes were wild. Without seeming to realize it, she shook Madoka as her voice climbed higher. "Tell me anyway. I need to know what you would do. Tell me!"

Madoka planted her feet apart and grabbed the insides of Homura's arms, stabilizing against the shaking. Homura still didn't seem to notice; her eyes were unfocused and jumping about. "I… I don't think it's good to do things that will make others hate you," Madoka tried. "Wouldn't it be better to make up with them and try to find a better way? If it's something that really would upset _everyone_ then you should think about whether it was really a good goal to start with?"

Homura stared at her for long heartbeats, eyes quivering. "Ah. That is what a sweet angel would answer, isn't it?" Her head fell forward, bowed to the ground between them, weight suddenly shifting forward into Madoka and almost throwing her off balance. Soft laughter fell from her lips.

"Homura?"

"Of course you wouldn't understand. We walk on different paths; your feet are too clean to wade through my for my sins, I really do deserve this." Homura still sagged into her as if ready to fall, but her hands on her shoulders clenched with desperate strength. "In the end, it really is better to rule in hell."

Homura straightened up, letting go of Madoka's shoulders and taking her elbows as if ready to embrace her. Homura's eyes burned with feverish intensity, catching the glinting light of the amethyst gem that hung from her earring. "Wishes, Madoka. I told you that a girl's wish was an intimate thing, didn't I? And I promised that someday, I'd tell you mine. Would you like to know?"

"Yes! Yes, I would! Please tell me, Homura!"

Sudden hope died as Madoka caught a glimpse of Homura's cruel smirk before her friend leaned forward til their heads were side by side. "There was a girl," Homura said, voice reverent. "She was beautiful, brave, wise. And beyond all else, she was kind. Her selflessness drove her onward where any other would have fallen, and her compassion drove her to make a wish mightier than any other. She saved me when no one else could have. I wanted to help her. Not just to pay a debt, and not just because I loved her. That's what it was at first, but in the end I did it because the world was nothing without her. So when no one else could save her, I made my wish to do exactly that."

"W-what happened to do her? Where is she now?"

"Dead."

Madoka's heart was sore inside her chest and tears threatened her composure. She moved closer and wrapped Homura up in as big a hug as she could, praying that some of the sympathy she felt would reach her. "I… I'm so sorry."

Homura's arms slipped around her in return, one tight around her waist, the other against her back with the hand cupping the back of Madoka's head, pressing Madoka in tight enough to never be apart again. "Dead by my own hand. I killed her, Madoka. She begged me to." Homura giggled. "I wanted to tear the whole world apart so there was nothing sad left, but she wouldn't let me. She begged me to kill her instead. I pressed a gun against her soul gem, and I ended her life."

Madoka began trembling as Homura's breath tickled her ear.

"You remind me of her, Madoka. You remind me of her so much in every way. The same heart. The same spirit. Only you would care for me when I deserve nothing of the sort."

"I'm sorry you had to do that," Madoka whispered, voice shaky. Homura's fingers were tangled in her hair, and she was suddenly sure that she'd missed her chance to run. "I'm so, so sorry. B-but that's the past, Homura. You're safe here, I promise."

Homura wasn't listening. "You _more_ than remind me of her. You are exactly her, Madoka, in every way." Homura moved to press their foreheads together, denying any distance between them. Madoka swallowed, throat dry and tight; Homura's smiling lips looked so soft and her eyes fixed on her like a hypnotic viper. A whisper crept from Homura.

"I'll kill you too, dear Madoka."

Her knees finally gave out; she sagged into Homura, who caught her weight.

"Even if I don't want to, I'll ruin you in the end. It's my nature. It's what I do. I sin and sin and sin, I make it all worse no matter what I do. I'll tear you apart, I'll bind you down and drain you of everything that makes you perfect."

Madoka found herself falling as Homura abruptly let go of her. She hit the ground and scrambled backward on all fours.

"Stay away from me, Madoka," Homura said, stalking forward and keeping up easily with Madoka's retreat. "Hate me."

"No." It was weak, but Madoka took a shuddering breath and made herself stop moving backward. "No. I can't."

Cold fury burned in the eyes of the girl looming over her. "Why? Why not? Run! It's what I deserve!"

She couldn't. She was terrified and trembling, but she couldn't run. She kept her head down, where she couldn't see Homura's anger, and reached a hand forward. "Madoka…" A harsh warning in Homura's voice. If she could just touch Homura, grab her skirt, feel her skin, make Homura understand somehow that _she wasn't leaving_ …

Magic surged, the smell of rusty gears and bitter wine seeping into the air. The sense of clocks running back, and Madoka's hand clasped empty air as Homura vanished between instants. She stared at her hand for a few desolate seconds before she couldn't hold back the tears any longer.

OoOoO

The wind was cold this far up as Homura's shaky hands gripped the edge of a high rise rooftop and stared unblinkingly into the sky.

 _'You certainly know how to make a mess of things, Akemi Homura.'_

One hand shot into the air, wrapped in burning purple light; soft black feathers drifted on the wind as an unseen power yanked Kyubey off the rooftop and dragged it suspended into the air. Its body bulged as if squeezed, creaking and contorting under pressure. It strained helplessly while Homura held it there, until a single cry of agony ripped from its throat and was swallowed into the wind. Its structure ruptured, and marshmallow went everywhere.

Kyubey arrived once again, padding along the edge of the roof and blank smile firmly in place. _'It's likely to be that type of day again? In that case, I'll have an especially large contingent of reserves standing by for replacements.'_ An arrow of purple energy slammed into it, erasing its body from the world in an instant.

 _'If you're that unhappy to see me, you could simply send me away. Is this a deeply inconvenient time for you?'_

Homura lowered a finger with a deep breath, looking much relieved. "I have no reason to avoid an enslaved, powerless wretch like you, Incubator."

 _'Excellent. After all, how can I carry out my assigned duties if I can't report to you? Incidentally, my assigned duties compel me to inform you that you're making an absolute mess of things. Predictably so, of course.'_

If Kyubey was cowed by Homura's icy glare, it didn't show it at all. It padded over to the remains of the first Incubator body on the scene and lowered its head into the mess, tail swishing. _'Yes, predictably. You are remarkably consistent in certain areas, Akemi Homura. Well, let me qualify that. You're actually botching matters even more thoroughly than my projections expected, so you're actually going above and beyond predictions. You started by ineptly handling the memory erasures…'_

"I left them their hearts and their feelings on purpose, Incubator," Homura said, sounding like she didn't need magic to kill Kyubey because scorn alone would suffice. "They wouldn't be themselves otherwise. I wouldn't expect an unfeeling monster like you to understand that."

Kyubey stiffened for a moment, even its tail halting mid-swish, before continuing in its flat voice. _'Doing so has also given them a great deal of cognitive dissonance from emotions belonging to lives they no longer remember and which differ from their current circumstances.'_

"They've found the people they care about because of this, you idiot."

 _'Well, I suppose that's accurate enough to give some merit to the method, if that's your goal.'_ Kyubey finished eating and began cleaning itself like a cat, running a tongue over the fur of its forepaws. Homura glowered, but otherwise didn't respond to its cutesy act. _'Everyone's been drawn quickly and happily together, correct? After all, the only instance where this method seems to be causing trouble is Miki Sayaka. As she is, you're all but torturing her.'_

Homura snarled.

 _'Enough about your poor ability with memory manipulation, though. Your incompetence isn't limited to one area, after all. You were never skilled with communication, but how did you manage to completely alienate Sakura Kyouko in the very first private conversation you two held? Even I can't manage that sort of performance unless I'm attempting to recruit an exceptionally suspicious and inquisitive girl. She was so eager to give you her cooperation and good graces, too!'_

"S-she wants to save me," Homura said, arms coming up and twitching as if to hug herself. "I don't need any of them to save me! They're not supposed to. They're supposed to stay put!"

Kyubey padded forward, red eyes suddenly fixating on Homura. It tried twining about her ankles, but a kick sent it flying. It righted itself without much trouble, though it limped slightly. _'Are you sure you wouldn't have managed this if she'd been asking for nothing more than the time of day, Akemi Homura? You're so determined to ruin yourself. To be honest, I fully expected this sort of outcome from you speaking with Sakura Kyouko, but I didn't think it would be this immediate or spectacular.'_

"Incubator. _Why are you here?_ "

 _'I am, of course, providing analysis on threats to your plan, as assisting you is my duty. That the most dangerous of such threats happens to be your own self-destructive proclivities is certainly no doing of mine. I'm also using this opportunity to refine my psychosocial models. After all, I never would have predicted that you would attempt to scare away Kaname Madoka!'_

"Don't talk about her!"

 _'It was entirely unexpected and illogical!'_ Kyubey leaned forward for a better look at the fury twisting Homura's face. _'I was under the impression that being with Kaname Madoka was still one of the primary goals of your ideal world. Now you've even directly sabotaging that! I'm constantly amazed at how readily so many puella magi destroy themselves.'_

Kyubey was yanked off the ground and flew through the air to smack into Homura's hand, which closed around its throat. A stream of dark coruscating grief flowed out from her soul gem dangling from her ear and forced its way into Kyubey's body, sending it into spasms. "Don't talk about Madoka!"

Kyubey's body was wheezing and twitching, but it kept going. _'Then shall we talk about you and me? Your methods might improve if you understand the basis of mine. You used to have such a cool head prior to the isolation field experiment. You weren't truly emotionless as we Incubators were, of course, but you still ruled your emotions rather than the other way around. You could be cold and analytical where other girls were unprofitably emotional. It was part of why you were such an effective puella magi. We Incubators truly preferred working with you above all others. Where did you go so wrong, Akemi Homura? Your odds would improve considerably if you were to readopt that methodology.'_

"My love and devotion for Madoka are the only reason that matter. If you think I can throw my heart away, you've completely missed the point. My pain, for her wellbeing! My world, for her home! My desire, for her smile! You'll never understand that, Incubator! Never!"

 _'Which brings me nicely to another point. Even though your emotional control has slipped lately, you remain similar to me in an even more important way: you truly understand the value of achieving your goals by any means or cost necessary. It's highly commendable. You manipulate, you lie, you trap, you overpower. You even sacrifice your own reputation and lead your comrades to despise you simply because you seem to believe Kaname Madoka is better off with one fewer link to the world of puella magi. Kaname Madoka claimed there's no good reason to make everyone hate you and that you should reexamine your goals, but I disagree. That sort of focused ruthlessness is exactly the approach necessary to achieve results.'_ Kyubey cocked its head to the side and closed its eyes, matching with its fixed smile to present the very image of adorable encouragement. _'You would make an excellent Incubator, Akemi Homura!'_

"You—!"

 _Shlink._

Kyubey stiffened, and then its head rolled off.

Homura dropped the body and jumped back as the spearhead that had cut Kyubey in half pulled back, its animated chain-shaft swaying like a scorpion's tail.

"That's enough garbage outta that fucker." Kyouko sat perched on the raised edge of the rooftop, balancing on the balls of her feet and wearing her crimson puella magi clothing.

"Sakura?"

She grinned, feral and ready, retracted the spear and slung it over her shoulder. "'Sup."

"H-how?"

Kyouko cackled. "What're you talking about, Twintails? It was easy. Just had to stay with the crowd, don't stand out, and tap a little bit of illusion magic to hide my presence. It really helps that you go kinda tunnel vision whenever our sweet little Madoka's around, so thanks for that."

A cold glare, as Homura recovered her composure and slid her mask back in place.

"And to answer the _other_ question you wanna ask," Kyouko said, "I've been here since you and Pinkie left the classroom. You threw me off a few minutes when you ditched her on the sidewalk and ran off, poor girl. Looks like you stomped on her heart pretty good. Caught up in time to hear some interesting bits, though."

"It's none of your concern, Sakura Kyouko."

"Oh ho, back to full name basis all sudden, fucking scary. Grow an extra pair of ears in your ears while you're at it if you really wanna talk like that fucker." Kyouko hopped down from her perch, stalking forward on light feet. "Well, you're probably right, though. None of my business what you're doing trading crap with the Incubator, even if I never heard him that vicious before. Only bit that really interests me is, are you really giving up on Pinkie?"

"I said it's none of your concern." A brief flash of light, and Homura's school uniform was replaced by the purple, black, and white of her puella magi transformation and shield on her arm.

Kyouko laughed. "Fucking hell it's not! Pinkie's my cute little friend too. Not gonna let you freak her the hell out just because you're still sad you shot your old girlfriend."

"Don't speak of things you don't understand, Sakura. I'm not in the mood for your antics."

Kyouko completely ignored the dangerous edge in Homura's voice, barreling right onward with a perverse glee. "Can't even figure out why you'd want to dump Pinkie after that. Beautiful, brave, wise. And beyond all else, kind." Kyouko rolled her tongue around Homura's own words with savory appreciation. "Awesome girl, isn't she? Sweet and adorable as fuck on top of that. Balm for the wounded soul, affectionate and eager, just waiting to be used."

The shield bucked, and Homura caught the pistol it shot out. " _Don't talk about her like that_!"

"But hell, if you're really trying to run her off, I'll take her off your hands. I never got on this good this fast with someone in my whole life. Even Sayaka and me were at each other's throats for a month. Yeah, I could use a cute little girlfriend like Madoka to work the stress out after a night of fighting wraiths." Kyouko planted her spear upright in front of her and pressed herself into it, leering at Homura. "Oh Madoka, I'm so hurt and lonely, oh please Madoka, won't you help me feel _alive_?"

A shot rang out, and a chunk went flying out the back of one of Kyouko's knees. She flung her weight onto the spear without hesitation, making it fall forward toward Homura even as chain links appeared to wrap around and reinforce her wounded leg. Homura jumped back, taking a slash from the falling spear blade across her arm but avoiding it biting into her body. Kyouko barreled forward, knocking Homura's shield arm to the side with her spearand then letting it fall to the ground as she charged in. Homura ran a surge of magic through her shield trying to make it activate, but Kyouko had a spearhead minus the shaft in one hand and wielded it like a dagger, jamming it into the clockworks and halting them in place.

Then they collided, and the brawl began. Homura's pistol cracked and bucked, but Kyouko knocked the arm aside and the gun went scattering. A kick to Kyouko's wounded knee. A headbutt to break Homura's nose. One good punch to rattle Kyouko's jaw, and then it was elbows and guts and knees as they rolled over one another, throwing down against the concrete rooftop.

When they settled Kyouko was on top. A fresh pistol jumped from Homura's shield; she caught it in her left hand and shoved it against Kyouko's forehead. Kyouko had another spearhead held like a dagger over Homura's throat, broad blade poised for decapitation should she throw her weight into it.

Kyouko spat a mouthful of blood off to the side and laughed. "Bullshit. I call bullshit. You said you didn't have any regrets. That's bullshit!"

The gun in Homura's hand trembled with anger. "All this to make a meaningless point? I'd expect this from Miki, not you."

Kyouko's grin was fierce and unrepentant. "Yeah, well Blue rubbed off on me pretty hard."

Homura scoffed before flinging her gun to the side and shoving Kyouko off. Kyouko went with it, rolling to the side and back up to her feet, still holding her dagger. "You're regretting this _right now_. You want Pigtails around, quit lying to yourself."

"I'd do it again." Homura's hands twisted against the ground as she knelt, hunched forward. "I'd do it all again. There's none of it I wouldn't do all over again."

"That doesn't mean you don't regret it. You're a goddamn dumbass, Twintails."

"None of you would understand! You wouldn't, can't. None of you. This is mine alone!"

Kyouko slid a strip of pocky out of one of her hidden boxes with her left hand. She nibbled at it, not offering any, dagger still held in her right hand and ignoring the pool of blood slowly gathering at her feet. She watched as Homura shook.

OoOoO

"You mean you can regrow _anything_?" Madoka asked.

"Limbs, organs, core. As long as the soul gem is still intact and we've got enough juice."

That was… weird. Probably useful! But weird. Really weird and gross. "…Head?"

Sayaka looked at her sidelong. "Never wanted to test it. Hey, I probably should sometime though, right? It's not like I can grow one worse than my current model!"

"Sayaka, don't joke about that!" She knew Sayaka dealt with things by laughing them off, but the image of her best friend actually _losing her head_ in a fight twisted her stomach into all kinds of nauseous knots. Oh, why had she even asked? Morbid curiosity never turns out well. She sighed, and tugged Sayaka onward by their linked arms. "Come on, we should keep going."

"Poor confused me still has no idea where you're dragging us," Sayaka grumbled.

After trying in vain to find Homura, Madoka had calmed down, stopped crying, and called Sayaka. She claimed Homura had remembered something she needed to do; she was pretty sure Sayaka didn't buy it. But her best friend also wasn't asking what happened, or why she was burrowed into her side and not letting go when it was energetic Sayaka who was usually the touchiest out of the two of them.

Homura didn't want to tell her anything at all. Sayaka was willing to talk about the nuts and bolts of puella magi, and even some about herself. They'd already spent one night up late on the phone talking about Sayaka's wish to heal Kyousuke and the illusions she was harboring when she made it. Madoka remembered how wounded Sayaka sounded underneath; she'd need to thank Kyouko for being there. But Sayaka still wasn't talking about Homura, why they fought, or what was still bothering her.

But there might be someone else she could ask. She didn't know _where_ she was, exactly, but Madoka was sure she'd find out eventually. She also thought Sayaka wouldn't like Madoka talking to her, so she should probably do this alone, but...

 _"I'll kill you too, dear one."_

She was sure Homura would never hurt her. She was! Homura was just trying to… scare her away.

But Madoka still didn't want to be alone right now.

"You'll know where we're going if we find it," Madoka finally answered. She looked up and down the street, counting tin soldiers. Three, two at intersections and one standing guard in front of a crammed-full little CD trading store Madoka knew Sayaka liked. Would following them give her better odds? It was worth trying. "How long does, um, growing new… bits… take?"

Sayaka let their destination go for now, thankfully, even though Madoka's answer probably just raised more questions. "Eh, it varies, but for most of us it's slow and expensive. Kyouko once told me it would take her a few days and a fistful of cubes to fix a mangled leg I did for her in about ten seconds. But you get powers that match your wish, so little dummy Sayaka got healing magic. It's saved my ass more than a few times, and Kyouko's too."

"Good!" Madoka clung harder to Sayaka's side. "I'm glad you have something so… so useful." Why Sayaka? Why her friends? Why were _any_ of them talking about things like regrowing legs? "You should use every advantage you can get to fight wraiths." But Kyouko seemed to think she was better off as she was instead of in her old life. She kept going on about how some girls had good reasons for wishing. And Homura, who wished to save the girl who saved her…

She didn't know, she didn't know!

Her best friend, who always pretended to be so dense but always picked up on her moods anyway, bumped her hip with a grin. "Hey, you don't need to worry about us so much, okay? All the girls in this city are good at what we do, me and Kyouko especially. We'll be fine. We're just that awesome!"

"Thank you, Sayaka." She was going to worry anyway, of course. But it was nice to know Sayaka knew she worried. She might be more careful that way!

…Madoka sighed.

And she wasn't finding what she was looking for, either. It was a big city, certainly, but somehow she was certain she'd find it somewhere near her. It stood to reason, if her guesses were right.

Maybe she should just ask directions?

She stopped and watched one of the tin soldiers. It was… still creepy. Why didn't any of them have faces? Homura claimed they were part of the world's magic serving to fight off wraiths, but… that was what puella magi did too, and they had faces of their own. They had hearts and personalities and lives. The tin soldiers had inklings of personality about them, in their colorful uniforms and braided hair and red rimmed glasses over blank faces. But it was like everything else had been ground off but their one single purpose.

"Madoka?"

"I'm sorry, but could you… wait here a minute?" Madoka left Sayaka, obviously unhappy as she watched Madoka run over to the tin soldier.

The soldier's neck creaked faintly as it turned its head to face Madoka. Or, point at her, since it didn't have a face? Something.

"Um, sorry, can, can I ask you a question?"

The soldier didn't move. Madoka hesitated, then, not wanting Sayaka to hear and have time to object, she leaned in to whisper her question where the soldier's ear would be if it had one. After a long moment of silence, she felt belatedly stupid as she began wondering if the tin soldier could even understand her, let alone answer. But then one uniformed arm rose and pointed, off the main roadways and into the quieter parts of the city. In fact, following the line, Madoka thought she had a good idea where she was going now.

She quickly bowed. "Thank you for your help, miss soldier!"

"What was that about?" Sayaka asked, scowling a little.

"Asking directions," Madoka non-answered, then ignored Sayaka's flat look and dragged her along by the arm as fast as she could.

After a short jog, it turned out she was right about their goal. They ended up, once again, at the huge park not far from her house. She and Homura came here for the playground last week, she and Kyouko came here Sunday to talk before the wraiths attaacked again. She kept ending up here somehow.

Who she was looking for wasn't on the playground though, or the sports fields around it. After running around the park with an increasingly irate Sayaka, she finally spotted her goal in the rolling foothills and walkways in the deepest part of the park.

"Ring around the crying girl, dropping all her shiny pearls!"

There were five of them, all children in dark clothes, spinning around through the flowers with their hands linked. Sayaka stiffened at Madoka's side, posture changing to a ready stance and one hand moving out in front of Madoka to stop her.

"Teardrops, teardrops, we all fall down!"

All five children went down in a tangle, most of them laughing endlessly. Madoka recognized the girl she'd seen while being chased by wraiths, Manuke, wearing the same bobble-hooded dress as before and shrieking with delight. Actually, now that she looked, the bobble on top wasn't knit, it was a tight knot of the girl's own orange hair poking through a hole in the top.

"Ganko was the last to fall down," announced the first to climb back to her feet. She had long blond hair, cold eyes, and sounded like she was trying to be bossy but would rather smack the others into line. "It's Ganko's turn to be the good-for-nothing."

"I saw Warukichi still up after me," protested Ganko, the girl the first was pointing at. She had gloves, a too-warm looking hat on top of braided hair, and a belligerent tone. "Why isn't she the good-for-nothing this time?"

"Because I didn't see her and I'm the boss," said the first, and punctuated it by kicking Ganko in the shins. "Stop being stubborn!"

"Ow! Why are you in charge anyway, Reiketsu?"

"Because Ibari and Nekura aren't here, and Usotsuki is busy working! Now hurry up, hurry up stupid heads! We have to start the stoning! First one to stop throwing rocks gets stoned too!"

The first girl, Reiketsu, immediately snapped a flower from its stem and threw it at Ganko. The other three children followed suit, ripping the heads off flowers and throwing them at the girl curled up at their feet, then grabbing the torn-up flower heads and flinging them over and over. Ganko shrieked and writhed, contorting and moaning in mock-pain as her friends pelted her again and again.

Sayaka kept an arm out like a shield even as her smile was light and flippant. "Hey Madoka, why don't we let the kids play and head to my place? We'll burn through homework and then we can hit video games with Kyouko."

"They're something like the tin soldiers, aren't they?" Madoka nodded at the children as they linked hands and started whirling around again. "Those kids. Back in my first miasma, Manuke was there. I didn't realize it right away because I was panicking, but I was the only human pulled inside the miasma, and Manuke was still there with the tin soldiers. They're magic, aren't they?"

"…yeah. Yeah, they are," Sayaka said, looking far from happy, then started in shock as a sixth child skipped past her and Madoka, heading toward the others.

The newcomer skipped along, making her vivid red hair like Kyouko's bounce beneath the veiled hat that covered it, and smirked at the two of them. "I definitely wasn't following you, angel of the depths, I've got no reason to! But since you're stopping here, I might as well play with my sisters." She ran over to the others, who called out "Usotsuki! Usotsuki, come play!"

"Please don't worry," Madoka said, trying to hug Sayaka from the side while the other girl was busy glaring at the children. "They're not going to hurt us, I'm sure of it."

"That's not what I'm worried about," Sayaka said.

"Ring around the crying girl, dropping all her shiny pearls!"

"I just want to talk to them." Madoka looked pleadingly at Sayaka, willing her to understand how badly she needed to find out anything they could tell her.

Her friend twisted frustration into a smile. "That's what I'm worried about."

"Teardrops, teardrops, we all _fall down!_ "

Madoka squeezed Sayaka once more and took a few nervous steps toward the children. "Um, hello there, excuse me…"

"Don't speak to her," Reiketsu called out as she shoved her way out of the pile. "Mistress Good-For-Nothing will pull your head off if you do!" Most of the children except Manuke eeped and looked away from Madoka as hard as they could, and Reiketsu giggled at the look of sharp rejection on Madoka's face. "Warukichi was last still up, Warukichi's the good-for-nothing this time. We'll hang the first one to stop the stoning! All your sins on the good-for-nothing, make her bleed for every one of them!"

Flower heads flew, the children cackled and danced, and Warukichi writhed, shouting that they were all fools and backstabbers, once or twice shouting in real pain when Reiketsu's foot flew in with the make-believe rocks. Jagged woodchips joined the flowers, probably brought over from the playground, drawing out more screams from Warukichi.

"That looks like a fun game, but you shouldn't be so rough," Madoka said, trying again. She walked over to them and leaned down to be closer. "I haven't done anything like Ring Around the Rosie in a long time. Could I play with you?"

Horrified stares and a long silence met her until the children found their voices cowering at the bottom of their throats.

"We've always played with just our sisters," Ganko said, looking aghast. "How would we play Crying Girl with someone else?"

"Absolutely not," said a child shaking side to side, sending her knee-length dress and the silky black ribbons that caught her long hair swishing in time. "What would happen if you had to be the good-for-nothing? That would ruin everything we have. Stay back and watch."

"Yakimochi is right! We mustn't risk pink girl becoming the good-for-nothing!" Reiketsu snarled.

"You're trying to get us in trouble, aren't you?" Warukichi demanded, wagging her finger at Madoka.

Manuke rose an unsteady hand. "I'll stay up last if we let her play. That way she won't ever be the good-for-nothing." Reiketsu smacked Manuke's hand back and pulled her hood down over her eyes.

Usotsuki tapped her fingers together, looking at Sayaka with an excited grin and her eyes flashing green in pleasure. "Let the angel play instead if she wants to. She would make a perfect good-for-nothing!"

"Why do you call the person who's 'it' good-for-nothing in this game?" Madoka asked.

"Because she's worthless and baseless, truly used-up and good for nothing at all," Warukichi said, with hands clasped and a happy sneer.

Reiketsu laughed. "Beat her all you want, make her bleed with stones and flowers, she'll come back for more every time!"

"But you also talked about Mistress Good-For-Nothing like she was someone else, I'm sure you did." The children all went quite, looking nervous. Madoka nodded. "In fact, Manuke," the girl squeaked in fright, "When we were in the miasma, right before Homura and Sayaka showed up to save me, didn't you say everything was okay because Good-For-Nothing was there now? Sayaka, I don't think you're Good-For-Nothing, are you?"

Sayaka laughed once with bitter amusement. Madoka nodded and said, "I thought so. That means Homura is Mistress Good-For-Nothing, doesn't it?"

There was a long silence, broken by Reiketsu burying her fist in Manuke's side and hissing, "Good-For-Nothing's going to twist your head off now, idiot."

Madoka walked into the crowd of children, stopping in front of Reiketsu and smiling. Reiketsu flinched away like she'd been struck. "Hey, you shouldn't treat your sisters like that, okay? Be nicer to them, and they'll be nicer to you too. Okay?"

Rekietsu crossed her arms over her jacket and pouted off to the side. Manuke stared at the ground, sniffling faintly.

"So then, why is Homura Good-For-Nothing?"

A wall of voices hit her. "She just is, she's always been good for nothing!" "Because she keeps losing her toys!" "She's foul and foolish and cruel and bitter and hates kittens and makes cute girls cry everyday!" "Because she weeps so beautifully when she's kicked!" "Because she hates everyone!"

Madoka turned to the only girl who hadn't said anything. "What do you think, Manuke?"

The other children stared at Manuke, who wilted under their glares. Madoka smiled encouragement, and Manuke kept her eyes on the ground as she answered in a quiet voice.

"Because she threw herself from heaven."

"What do you mean, threw herself from heaven?"

Shyly, Manuke raised her head and found Madoka was still smiling kindly at her. "There's a story I heard," Manuke started. "Once upon a time, there was a beautiful and radiant goddess…"

"Oh, not that stupidity again," Reiketsu said.

"It's nonsense," Yakimochi said, playing with her ribbons. "If there was a goddess like that, we'd put her in a box so we couldn't lose her, and then she'd hate us forever."

"Let her talk," Usotsuki said as she fiddled with her skirt and the net keeping her hair in place. "It's nice to hear some silly lies now and then, it's good for the soul."

"You're just waiting for her to say something that gets her head cut off. You're such a terrible liar," Warukichi told Usotsuki.

Manuke spun around to face her sisters, hands clasped pleading before her. "It's really true, I heard the story from Good-For-Nothing's heart! There's a goddess who will love us, one that watched over the world from her throne in heaven. She's beautiful and brave and wise and kind!"

Reiketsu glared stonily at her, hands shoved in her jacket pockets. "It sounds like Manuke wants to be the good-for-nothing this time. First one to stop stoning gets beaten into pieces along with her," she said, and flung something hard and fast. _Thwock._ Manuke reeled back from the blow, then fell over with a cry when Warukichi, Yakimochi, and Ganko jumped up behind Reiketsu and flung something of their own. Four rocks tumbled to the ground around Manuke.

"Stop it!" Madoka shouted, and sprung forward over Manuke to shield her with her body. "Stop it right now or I'll tell Homura!" A burst of blue light, and Sayaka flowed to Madoka's side in her duelist's uniform, swords at the ready to fight.

"There's more of us, and you won't tell if we beat you black and blue. Stay out of our sisters' business!" Reiketsu said, arms crossed and eyes flashing red. Warukichi, Yakimochi, and Ganko flanked her, looking just as angry.

Usotsuki's cackling laugher cut across them. "Yes, because Good-For-Nothing would never care if pink girl got hurt." She flipped a hand dismissively in the air, eyes green with mirth. "What a silly idea that would be!"

Reiketsu faltered at that, her gang looking suddenly nervous behind her, and looked fearfully at Madoka's determined and angry expression. "W-we were done playing here anyway," she said. "Come on, we're finding something else to do!"

Madoka sagged in relief and Sayaka lowered her swords as Reiketsu and her three sisters vanished away into the world. Madoka knelt down next to Manuke and put on her warmest big sister voice. "They're gone now. Are you okay?"

Manuke had tears in her eyes and both hands clamped over the side of her head. "I think they chipped me!"

"Oh no, that sounds terrible. Can I do anything to help it?"

Manuke shook her head forlornly. "Good-For-Nothing will fix it sooner or later."

Madoka smiled and patted Manuke's head. "If she can fix you, then I guess she's actually good for something, isn't she?" Off to the side, Sayaka snorted in amusement; Manuke just looked confused. "Maybe some ice cream will help?" Madoka offered. "There's a place I like not far from the park."

"You don't have to," Manuke said, looking like she wasn't sure why Madoka was being so nice to her.

"Maybe, but I want to. You can tell us your story about the goddess while we walk there. Would you like that?"

Manuke slowly nodded, and took the hand Madoka offered to help her up. The four of them left the park, Manuke clinging to Madoka's arm. Sayaka dropped her transformation but still flanked Madoka's other side in a way that made it clear she was watching everyone and prepared to break heads if necessary. Usotsuki trailed behind them, skipping in a loose orbit around Sayaka and watching her the entire time. As they walked, Manuke began to tell her story.

OoOoO

Once upon a time, there was a beautiful and radiant goddess who watched over the world from her golden throne in heaven. The goddess loved all the world below her and all the people within it, but it also made her very sad, for the world was a place where terrible things happened to girls who did not deserve them.

One day the girl left her throne in heaven and went down, looking for people who needed help. Right away, she came across a great maze at the end of the world where heaven and hell clasped hands. "Someone might be lost inside that endless maze, seeking the way out," she said to herself. "I can't have that!"

So she flew over the maze, looking for people who needed help. She saw dead ends and traps, terrible monsters lying in wait, illusions to trick the unwary. Finally she came across a crying girl lost in one of the many twisting paths. "Why are you here crying in this maze so far from safety?" asked the goddess.

"Because I was tricked into coming here," said the crying girl. "I met a snake who told me there were wonderful things in this maze. It promised me I could find a reason to live at the very center."

"Perhaps you were tricked, but the snake did not lie," said the goddess. "I saw the center of the maze as I flew above it, and there is indeed a beautiful treasure there, but not one of use to a mortal girl. Only a god could bear and use that gift. Since it is no use to you, let me guide you away from this place."

"Yes, please," the crying girl begged. "Take me away and save me from this place!"

So the goddess flew above the maze, directing the girl. Soon they came to the trials and obstacles that were scattered about the maze, which the crying girl and run from when she was wandering the maze alone.

They came to a circle clearing guarded by a fearsome clockwork dragon, draped in silks of blue and white and prowling the path. "The dragon will loose its fiery breath when you pass," the goddess told the crying girl. "Take my clockwork shield and endure the calamity." So the crying girl took the goddess's shield and hid behind it as she ran along the path, and the dragon's flame could not touch her.

They came to a path guarded by an army of giants robed in white, looking for little girls' souls to devour. "They will fall upon you if they think you fear them," the goddess told the crying girl. "Take my jeweled bow and never give up." So the crying girl took the goddess's bow and struck the giant's leader between the eyes, and they hid from her as she walked past them unchallenged.

They came to a path covered by darkness, and heard whispers telling them to turn back. "There's always a path," the goddess told the crying girl, pointing to a rod running by the path. "Take my ribbons and push forward." So the crying girl took the goddess's ribbons and tied her hand to the rod, and she did not lose her way or listen to the whispers as she followed the path.

On the other side of the darkness waited the exit to the maze. But just as the crying girl shouted in joy as she ran over the threshold, a trap fell down and snared the goddess. The crying girl wept hard as she tugged and pulled at the trap, so hard that she tore away a swath of the goddess's white dress, but to no avail. The trap was specially made with wicked power to catch those sacred beings that descend to earth out of love, and no little girl could hope to pry it apart.

The snake that had tricked the crying girl into the maze came slithering along, smiling as it saw her frantically trying to free the goddess. "You're a foolish goddess," it said, "not to see that this maze was built to catch you all along. I have uses for a goddess who cannot run away."

"I knew," said the goddess. "I saw it right away. But I could not leave the crying girl lost and alone."

"That only makes you more foolish indeed," the snake said, and laughed. "I'll let you go now, crying girl. You're free from the maze as you wanted, and you're not useful as bait any longer. You have to reason to stay."

But the crying girl's heart broke when she saw the goddess smiling serenely in the trap, and she could not leave her to the snake's clutches. She remembered what the goddess had said about a treasure useful to gods in the center of the maze, and ran inside.

She ran once again into the darkened path, the pale giants, and the clockwork dragon, and many other obstacles besides. But the crying girl had the shield and bow and ribbon blessed by the goddess, and beat them all. She did not know the way without the goddess to guide her, but she took an arrow and pricked her finger, and as she explored she drew a map in blood on the scrap of cloth she tore from the goddess's dress.

In time, after endless wandering, she found the center of the maze. The treasure waited for her, a shining gem on a pedestal. And in front of it waited the snake that had trapped the goddess.

"Why are you here looking for the goddess's treasure?" the snake asked.

"I've come to bring her the treasure, for it may help her," said the crying girl. "Get hence and leave me if you are not here to offer aid."

The snake conjured up visions of riches and comforts. "I have great power," said the snake, "And I can offer you all these things if you leave the maze and leave the goddess to her fate."

"Wealth means nothing if I can only enjoy it alone," said the crying girl, and ascended the steps before the pedestal.

The snake conjured up visions of witches and wraiths and nightmares. "You will forever struggle with monsters if you take this treasure," said the snake, "For it curses those who bear it."

"The world is already full of monsters who hunt little girls," said the crying girl as she stood over the gem.

"Stop!" Cried the snake. "You won't be human anymore if you take this gem. Is that truly what you want? You'll be as monstrous and terrible as the angels in heaven and the devils in hell, bound forever to a fate that no mortal can shoulder."

"Then I will conquer heaven and hell if I must," snarled the crying girl, and seized the gem.

The celestial and infernal flames ran within her, burning away her body and her soul, but she withstood the pain as the gem's glory remade her. Flush with power, she cast down the snake upon the steps to crush its head and ran into the maze bearing aloft the treasure. She came to the obstacles once again. The traps snapped uselessly against her flesh. The tricks and side paths shut themselves up, fearing her wrath should they deceive her. The pale giants fell on the ground before her in terror. The clockwork dragon smashed to pieces under her blows. The darkness burned away before her light.

She came to the exit again, where the goddess laid trapped, and with the power of the treasure she pried open the trap and pulled the goddess free. But the trap was cleverly and maliciously designed, and when the goddess flew out, it snapped tight around the girl and her treasure and would not let her escape.

"What have you done?" asked the goddess, horrified. "I led you from the maze so you could be free, not so you could take my fate yourself!"

"I know, dear goddess, I know," said the girl. "But you gave me something more precious than my freedom. You were kind and loving, as no one was to me before, so I will bear this gladly in your stead."

The goddess, unable to free the crying girl again, wept bitterly over her. But she was safe from the snake forever, and free to wander the world she loved once again or ascend back to heaven as she would. She wanders now, spreading her light to bless all those she meets.

OoOoO

"That's so sad," Madoka said. Her sundae sat forgotten in front of her, beginning to melt.

Manuke cocked her head to the side, confused. "Why?"

"Because the crying girl's still trapped! Wasn't the entire point to let everyone live happily at the end?"

"But crying girl saved the goddess, didn't she?" Manuke took a big bite out of her chocolate-dipped cone, which she hadn't been able to get to much while telling the story. "That's what she wanted, so she's happy enough."

"But the goddess isn't happy," Madoka said, "And she's not really free, because she wouldn't leave the crying girl alone again. If she really is wandering again, it's because she's looking for a way to get the crying girl out."

"Maybe." Manuke looked around. "I've been gone a long time. I should go home soon," she said reluctantly. Usotsuki nodded in agreement.

"Well, I'm happy I got to meet you properly this time, Manuke," Madoka said, and reached across the table to squeeze her free hand. "And I'm very happy I got to hear your fairy tale. If the others are mean to you about it again, you can tell them I liked hearing it and I like you, okay? And come tell me if they're being bullies again."

Manuke nodded and jumped out of her seat. "Thank you for the ice cream!"

"No problem! Actually, I have a little bit of a favor to ask you, though." Madoka waved Manuke in closer, and went on once Manuke leaned in eagerly. "I had so much fun I want to hear more of your stories sometime. Will you come see me again if I call for you?"

Manuke nodded hard enough to make her hood shake and, after hesitating a moment, dove in to give Madoka a hug, which the older girl returned. "Bye bye, pink girl!" Manuke said, then ran out the café's doors and melted away into thin air.

"Don't mind me," Usotsuki said, still at the table and finishing off her popsicle. They were the first words she'd spoken after leaving the park, other than replying when Madoka offered her a pick of icy treats. "You won't see me anywhere again." She shot a green-eyed, razor-sharp smile at Sayaka, then vanished into the air after her sister.

Madoka was ready to call shenanigans on that claim.

She let out a long breath and fiddled with her sundae before turning to Sayaka. Her friend had been quiet as Usotsuki the entire time, more than willing to let Madoka and Manuke do all the talking while she watched both children with sharp eyes. At first she seemed to expect them to try something, but once the story began Madoka could tell Sayaka was interested despite herself. "Well? What do you think?"

Sayaka swirled her spoon through her milkshake. "Anything I could say would sound fantastically unbelievable and get me in all sorts of trouble besides. But, you know," Sayaka smiled, a bitter undercurrent in the twist of her lips, "You could do a lot worse than pay attention to that doll's fairy tales."

"I see." So it was still shadow games, even now? Madoka shook her head. "Hey. Sayaka."

"Mm?"

"You said girls get special powers depending on what their wish is. Do you know Homura's?"

Sayaka looked at her over the rim of her cup. "Time magic. Freezes it."

"I see." Madoka nodded to herself. "Yeah. That would make sense, wouldn't it?"

Sayaka said nothing, only smirked and downed the rest of her milkshake.

OoOoO


	6. Chapter 6

.

* * *

 **OoOoO**

 **A Curse Between Us**

 **Chapter 6**

 **OoOoO**

* * *

The next day, Ms. Saotome noted the absences and drilled Sayaka about where her live-in guest was hiding, but otherwise class went on with a lecture about the proper way to make the bed on a frantic morning (sheets in a lump somewhere on top of the bed, not the floor, and any boyfriend who wants to complain about tidiness should learn to do some damn housework himself). Homura's empty seat went uninvestigated, since no one was responsible for her. Calls from the office to her apartment got voice mail.

Madoka spent all morning staring worriedly at one or the other gap, not listening to a word of their lessons. Sayaka watched Madoka. Kyouko sent her a text the night before saying she had things that needed doing and wouldn't be home so could she please stall Ms. Miki, then ignored all attempts at contact. Sayaka was certain she'd have to beat someone over the head later, she just wasn't sure who yet.

OoOoO

Sunlight trickled over her face, bringing her awake. The first thing she saw were lines of dust motes floating in the air, held up by colored beams of light. She felt drained to the core, but shifted and looked about anyway. Stain-glass windows, most of them broken and their scenes unrecognizable. She was lying on a wooden pew, one of a few undamaged ones in the large church, blankets tucked under and over her to soften her stiff bed and ward off the nighttime chill.

Half a dozen of her dolls flitted about the shadows out of step with the world, watching but not acting. She hadn't felt endangered, then, or they would have done something. Of course, why would she feel threatened here? The priest's daughter would never besmirch this place by harboring ill intent while inviting someone in. She could barely remember what happened after the fight last night, but dazed as she was, she probably went with Kyouko willingly.

"Rise and shine, Twintails. Sorry for the state of the place, but you weren't in much condition to tell me where your house is, and I figured dragging you back to the Miki's would get you a sword through the face. A church is supposed to be a house of safety, so I figured why not?"

Homura sat up and found Kyouko sitting on the ground near the altar at the front of the chapel. Spread about her was the debris of impromptu urban camping: a switched-off electric lamp, a grocery bag from a nearby convenience store, bottled water, bandages, and a second bag for trash. She didn't look up as she talked, as she was busy fiddling with a battered old flip phone.

"So what you might _not_ know, Ms. Your-Darkest-Secrets-Are-Mine, is I used to work with Tomoe Mami when I was a little squirt new to this puella magi shit. Taught me the ropes, really looked up to her. When everything went bad with my dad and the church, I took it out on her too. I was furious at the world and god and whatever else did this to me. Couldn't stand someone bright and upstanding like Mami telling me it'd get better and I just needed to keep helping others and doing the right thing, sounded way too much like Dad before I sent him round the twist. So Mami and me fought, then I took off."

A long silence, followed by some vile cursing under Kyouko's breath. "Course, young idiot me didn't realize Mami's like that 'cause it's how she holds together. It's her sense of purpose, and she was trying to ram it down my throat because she was terrified I'd leave if I strayed off the path we were on."

"Dad bought me this phone when we got some money after I made my wish. Along with, you know, tutors for school and food and new clothes and repairs to the church. Other than my family, Mami's number was the only one I ever put in here. Didn't have the heart to throw the thing away after we fought, didn't want to risk her calling me either, so I stashed it away at the church. Just gotta charge it and I can look her up again without dropping in on her apartment unannounced."

Kyouko snapped the phone closed and got to her feet, picking up the bags and water bottles but leaving the lamp. She limped over toward the bench Homura was on, no longer burning magic to boost her movement. Her leg sported tightly-wrapped and blood-stained bandages around the knee. For that matter, Homura vaguely remembered Kyouko setting her broken nose for her and wiping blood off her face the night before.

"So anyway. Puella magi business. Sayaka and me are going to try talking with Mami, see if we can go raid the Great Curse with her. You're not invited, for obvious reasons. I'd say don't tell Pigtails 'cause she'd get mad at everyone for you not playing with us too, but, heh, so much for that, you edgelord."

"I figure talking with Mami's gonna be twelve different kinds of suck, but it's long past time I fix things between her and me. Shit like this between friends, it doesn't get any better if you stay away. Just festers and gets worse 'n' worse. You're always thinking, what if I didn't drive off the one person who cares about me? Where'd I be now? But oh, I can't go back, stuff we did, can't take that back, no way. Just got a sit here in a broken-in hotel room and rot, kicking the 'what if's around my head while I can't sleep. It really sucks."

Leaning heavily on the ruins of the next bench up to take weight off her leg, Kyouko stared at her blandly. Homura stared back, trying to look like she wasn't wrapped in Kyouko's blankets. Time ticked by.

"That was me subtly telling you to make up with Pigtails when she comes 'round mewling and making eyes at you, 'cause you know she's gonna," Kyouko said.

Homura fought off the urge to slap her hand to her face. "Yes, I got that, thank you."

"Welp, consider yourself lectured then." Kyouko pushed up and limped away toward the front door. "I've got a meeting to set up and a personal healer to visit over the lunchbreak. Just throw the blankets in the sacristy with my other camping supplies when you leave." She waved vaguely toward a door on one side of the front of the room. "And don't break anything on purpose or I'll come thrash you again!"

Her dolls crept out of hiding as soon as Kyouko was gone. Homura sighed, looking around the ruined church. They'd fought, practically tried to kill each other, and hadn't managed it. By Kyouko's rules, that probably made them friends now.

"Put these away," Homura said, handing the blankets off to Noroma as she stood. "And all of you, clean this place up a little," she snapped.

OoOoO

Healing was _boring_.

You'd think it shouldn't be. If doctors could see what was happening in Nagisa's body, they'd be running around in a panic and flinging their little clipboards through windows like frisbees. But they weren't here, and Nagisa didn't care, because all she could do was lie there with Mami's ribbons wrapping up her entire side to catch the blood and hold everything together while it healed.

The wound was even worse than Nagisa first thought. If she hadn't been Charlotte when she took it, Oktavia's ginormous sword would've just splatted her, but as it was she'd been cut nearly in half and lost an entire chunk of her abdomen. On the first day until they fixed the damage to her spine, feeling or moving any part of her body below her ribcage was iffy unless she was burning magic to pretend she had a functioning nervous system.

She twirled an ice cube around her mouth, sucking on it while she laid on the couch. It kept her mouth from getting dry, since she couldn't really drink anything. Or eat, because, you know, there were some important bits missing. And that meant—horror of horrors—no cheese!

…Nagisa giggled to herself at the thought, and brought out her clown face just because she could, makeup-pale skin and wonky eyes ringed in blue and red over a sickle-smile she didn't really feel. Stupid. Stupid stupid stupid.

Miss Akemi hadn't come by or sent any messages by Okubyou. She guessed she should probably be happy about that. It wasn't really surprising, either. What use was she, to Miss Akemi or Madoka or Mami or anyone, like this? Mami had a good store of grief cubes before this happened, but they'd burned most of that trying to put her organs back where they were supposed to be. Or make new organs, in a lot of cases. The way grief drained from their soul gems helped a lot, but it barely offset the cost of keeping her body fresh and functioning, since she was missing half the things humans needed to live and had technically bled to death while Mami was carrying her home anyway.

She didn't like the feeling of her heart not beating and blood not pumping through her veins. It felt like if she held still too long, she'd just become a rock and forget to start moving again.

She heard movement in the next room over, and made her face normal again just before Mami walked in. Mami was clenching her phone in her hand, and had been doing that since lunch when she got a phone call from… someone. She had also changed out of the slightly blood-stained pants and shirt she'd been wearing into a more presentable skirt and pastel blue blouse.

"O-oh, do you need to go out for groceries again?" Nagisa asked, trying to keep the disappointment out of her voice.

"Mm? Oh no, not at all! I stocked up quite well already. We might get short on perishables, but we'll be fine on everything else for several weeks. Much longer than we'll need to finish healing you."

Mami going far from the apartment meant the ribbons holding Nagisa's side together would vanish, so they had to take time to bind her up with normal bandages, and maybe spend extra magic to disinfect her when Mami got back. Not to mention Mami's ribbons masked everything with a nice flowery smell, while normal bandages… didn't. Mami had to go hunting every night for grief cubes, which was already more than enough of that.

"Actually, you remember I told you I used to work with a girl named Sakura Kyouko? She called me a little while ago and wants to have a word face-to-face. I've arranged to meet her on the apartment rooftop, so we shouldn't need to fiddle with your wraps." Mami was smiling and trying to look cheerful, but was clearly strained beneath. Taking care of Nagisa had left her tired.

"Why not bring her here?" Nagisa asked.

The strain grew tauter. "I believe I mentioned that we didn't part under the best circumstances? I'd rather not risk her being here while you're vulnerable."

Nagisa took as deep a breath as she could, a reflexive action that didn't do any good other than steady her nerves and make her feel more human, and forced herself to sit up. Lines of magic hummed and connected where muscles weren't, weaving through Mami's ribbons and bracing her upper body against insubstantiality.

"Nagisa! Please, don't push yourself!" Mami rushed forward and knelt by the couch in a worry, and Nagisa hugged her around the neck, holding tight to Mami and propping herself up at the same time.

And despite how damaged she was, despite how right now her body was corpsier than puella magi usually were, despite how Mami was doting on her and nursing her back to health, she was pretty sure she could fight like this. She wasn't sure how long her magic would last, but it would let her stand up and fight wraiths.

But here she was anyway, and this was all she could do.

"I knew a girl who saved me," Nagisa said as she clung to Mami. "She wanted puella magi to help each other and get along and always keep hoping. So please Mami, please please please, listen to what Kyouko wants to say even though she was mean and hurt you."

"Y-yes, of course I will." Mami clung back for a second before carefully pushing Nagisa back down to the couch. "I'll be off then. Try not to worry about me, okay?"

Nagisa sat in the quiet apartment for a few minutes after Mami left. She'd gotten sick of Mami's video games ages ago, all of Mami's books were too hard and didn't have enough pictures, and she'd already memorized the ceiling above both the couch and her bed. She reached over to grab one of the cushions and hugged it.

"Okubyou?" she called out into the empty apartment.

She'd gotten so used to the witchy cloud hanging over her senses that she barely noticed it anymore, but now it surged. Nagisa squeaked in fright as Okubyou was suddenly kneeling by the couch right where Mami had been moments ago, saying nothing.

Eventually Nagisa came out from behind the cushion. "Um, that is, I was maybe wondering, did Miss Akemi maybe forget about me?"

Okubyou shook her head. "Mami is happy enough taking care of you, so Good-For-Nothing is happy enough to let you still."

"But it's worrying Mami really bad," Nagisa said.

"We're never happier than when we're allowed to sit down and fret without having to risk climbing higher," Okubyou returned with a cold smile. "Aren't you?"

Nagisa shirked away from Okubyou's yellow stare. "That's terrible," she said, burying her face against the cushion.

Okubyou watched her.

"Miss Akemi wants Mami and Kyouko to get along so they can fight the Great Curse, doesn't she?" Nagisa tried again. "Couldn't you go watch them and see what happens at their meeting?"

Okubyou shook her head again. "Good-For-Nothing said to watch you, little clown, so watch you I will. I'll not risk Good-For-Nothing's anger. You shouldn't either. It's better to sit and do what you're told, and let others worry about the bigger things."

"Is that all you Clara dolls do? Whatever Miss Akemi tells you?"

"We're her heart," Okubyou said. "Of course we'll do what she wants to do. Would _you_ cross her, little caterpillar?"

She couldn't think of anything to snap back with, as much as she wanted to. She couldn't think much at all with Okubyou's scary yellow eyes glowing at her. Nagisa buried herself in the cushions again. Eventually, after far too long, her witch sense flared again when Okubyou got bored and vanished away.

OoOoO

What was that idiot doing, going after Homura alone like that?

Well, Sayaka kept thinking that and told Kyouko as much when she dropped by at lunch looking to get her knee patched up, but she kept sniggering anyway.

Kyouko hit her with telepathy just before lunch break and told her to get to the roof before Madoka; they managed to time it right so her oldest friend didn't see anything incriminating to make her pull out what Kyouko called "the shouty pink". It was, admittedly, a shock to hit the rooftop and see Kyouko standing there leaning on her spear with a knee blown out and generally bruised in ways that clearly had nothing to do with wraiths.

"Now before you go murder someone," Kyouko told her, "I was asking for it. Like, all but literally. And you shoulda seen the other bitch."

Heh.

And now Kyouko was getting ready to meet Mami, leaving Sayaka not much time at all. She'd walked with Madoka until their paths home split, then came here to an empty stretch of park. She'd considered doing this on top of some high rise, out of sight of the muggles, but ultimately decided having the extra space to fight and maneuver was safer for everyone if things went bad.

One last glance around the park. Wide open and empty.

She opened her mouth to call out—and stopped short when she saw a shuddering heap of white fur tucked under a shade tree nearby. Sayaka began scanning the park more carefully, trying to find more evidence of the Incubator.

She barely caught a flash of white movement in the distance, on a playground where it would have lots of things to duck behind and far outside easy sword-throwing range.

 _'Miki Sayaka. Speaking together would be to both our benefit. I can give you information on Akemi Homura's activities you likely won't get on your own.'_

Sayaka slammed back at the voice in her head, trying to force out the Incubator. Earlier, she actually had thought—briefly—about asking Kyubey, on the grounds that it was better than wandering around with no idea where she was going. Which was stupid and obviously wrong, because wandering around aimlessly wasn't a malicious bastard looking to ruin you. What she _actually_ planned… was probably just as bad, but she wouldn't know until she tried.

"Usotsuki," Sayaka said the word like it would call up devils. "I know you're here somewhere, Usotsuki. Come out and talk to me face to face." The white movement on the playground turned tail and darted out of sight the instant she spoke.

Sayaka stood alone for long seconds, moving around in place trying to catch the first glimpse of the doll before it could try anything. A wordless melody drifted out from one direction— _Ring around the crying girl, dropping all her shiny pearls_. Sayaka twisted around and found Usotsuki sitting atop a large chest-high rock, kicking her feet and humming.

"I thought for sure I'd tricked you when I said I wasn't around," Usotsuki told her with a giggle. "You saw right through me! Oh no!"

"…you aren't actually serious, are you?"

Usotsuki clapped her hands. "I'm always serious, foolish angel! Always, always!"

Usotsuki was clearly enjoying itself. Herself? Whatever. She seemed too lively for her dull gray blouse and black skirts, even it did have flairs of character like the lacey edges coming off the skirt or the beaded veil from her hat. Compared to her wardrobe's colors, her eyes glowing green in pleasure were as vivid and colorful as anything in the park around them. If only Usotsuki's hair wasn't the same familiar crimson as Kyouko's.

"You're the one Akemi stuck watching me, aren't you?"

"Not following you," Usotsuki stuck her tongue out. "Haven't got a reason to."

"I'll take that as a yes," Sayaka muttered. At least Usotsuki didn't try to hide what a liar she was. That gave her one up on Kyubey already. Louder, "I'm not here to twist words and play hidden meanings."

Usotsuki looked a little crestfallen. "You aren't?"

"If I was good at that, I'd have a go at talking with Kyubey."

"But twisty words are the only way to say what matters," Usotsuki said mournfully.

"All I want to know is where Akemi is. I want a word with her."

The Clara doll perked up at that, humming and hawing and the glow of her green eyes becoming stronger. She grinned widely. "Are you sure you want to trust me if I say I can take you to her?"

"Good question." Sayaka smirked back. "Maybe I'm just risking this to figure that out."

"What an answer, what answer!" Usotsuki laughed. "Are you always this interesting, fool knight?"

"I try."

Usotsuki went back to kicking her legs, peering at Sayaka in thought. After a minute she asked, "Do you know about places that aren't?"

If she was playing games… but Sayaka held her tongue and gave the doll a chance. "Explain."

"Everyone knows about places that _are_ , but have you ever imagined there are places that _aren't_?" The Clara doll jumped down from her perch on the rock and danced forward, prancing about until she came to a stop in front of Sayaka. "Places where far-off dreams are closer. Places were love and hope and other such lies are the stuff of the ground beneath our feet and the breath in our mouths and the blood in our veins. Have you ever imagined such a place, foolish angel?"

"Can't say I have."

"Oh really? Start thinking about them. In a world such as Good-For-Nothing's dream, you can stick the places that are and the places that aren't side by side and see them hanging in the sky and barely notice the difference. Do you think angels come from earth?"

A shock went through Sayaka at the last line. "What?"

Usotsuki giggled and ignored her outburst. "Did you notice when you came and went through the places that aren't? See? You didn't, did you? Isn't Good-For-Nothing's dream beautiful? Is and isn't, just the same, like they always were."

Sayaka stepped forward, fists clenched. "What do you mean about angels not coming from earth? What does this have to do with Akemi? Will you start making sense already!"

Usotsuki laughed and danced backward; Sayaka instinctively tried to grab her to keep her from escaping, but missed. The Clara doll waved to her and said, "I'm not leading you anywhere, knight angel errant," before taking off deeper into the park.

Sayaka dashed after her.

Laughing and prancing and calling out "Come on, faster, angel!" Usotsuki ran over the emerald grass. Sayaka easily kept pace as they went from wide open grass to baseball diamond to walking paths. They cut across the walkways through the flowers, purple lilies bending away to clear their path. Usotsuki put on a burst of speed and went up the hills that sat farthest back in the heart of the park, disappearing briefly as she rounded the top and charged down the other side. Sayaka swore and sprinted up the hill, first catching sight of the trail of bending flowers in her guide's her wake, then spotting the Clara doll herself. Usotsuki dashed up the larger hills behind them, vanishing once again behind the curve, and was already heading up the next slope by the time Sayaka found her again. Sayaka launched herself into the air to catch up, vaulting over the valley between hills.

Usotsuki paused an instant to stick her tongue out and shout "Cheater angel, no flying!" when Sayaka landed, then laughed and sprinted up the hillside path. Up and up and up as the hill continued to climb, and Sayaka dashed along behind her. Flowers gave way to grass and then to soil, the paved path became beaten dirt, and trees slowly sprung up around them. The path began winding around trees and rocks in the way as the hill became more uneven and mountainous.

"Slow down," Sayaka shouted as she started to lose sight of Usotsuki as the trail turned into switchbacks. There was a mountain range visible from Mitakihara along the very edge of the city's sprawl, but nothing like _this_ inside city limits. Pleased laughter echoing back down the mountain was the only sign of Usotsuki Sayaka could find. Of course the damn doll would play tricks on her. Better than wandering around aimlessly, maybe, but she shouldn't have trusted any of Akemi's things in the first—

The trail twisted, and Sayaka suddenly broke through the trees into the open air and skid to a stop.

The azure sky stretched out forever above her, and the half-moon hung close in the sky despite the daylight hour. The peak of the mountain was gently sloped, thick with wild flowers and grass that rippled in the soft breeze, then cut away sharply into sheer cliffs. Below, the city glinted in the sunlight. Sayaka walked forward, careful not to step on any of the flowers of this beautiful place. There definitely weren't any mountains _this_ close to the heart of Mitakihara, but hey, apparently that didn't matter and here they were. Perched at the very edge of the cliff, Akemi sat at a small table, looking out into the distance with her back to Sayaka.

"Little lying doll's good for her word after all," Sayaka muttered. She hesitated a second, then walked closer until Akemi turned to watch her. The other girl looked like she hadn't slept in days and was trying to figure out who to kill to fix that. Sayaka called out. "Oi, Akemi. I thought about announcing myself by throwing a sword into your table. Be grateful I didn't feel like messing up the scenery any."

The glare Akemi gave her was haggard. "You wanted to talk. Or are you here to kick me too?"

Ah. Of course. "So your doll only led me here because you gave the go ahead," Sayaka guessed. Akemi's tired smirk was confirmation enough. "I told you I'll have a clear head next time I start something," Sayaka said as she walked over to the table, checking out the view of the city as she did. "I've still got rocks rolling around my skull, so it'll have to wait a bit."

Akemi watched her for a moment, but went back to staring over the city instead of replying.

"You're looking pretty good for someone who ran into a redhead yesterday," Sayaka went on. "I was sure you'd still have a bruised everything." Despite how tired she looked, she didn't have a single visible wound on her.

"Do I look like I'm in the mood for this, Miki?" Akemi snapped. "What are you here for?"

"Oh come on, do I need a reason to come visit my good buddy Homura?"

A thin angry crack came from the glass goblet Akemi clenched in one hand, the same purple drink she had the first time the met—the _real_ first time they met, not the false memories of being puella magi in the same city. By the creek when Akemi did… something to Sayaka's head. Akemi forced herself to take a sip of it, and shuddered. "I don't need an answer anyway, Miki. I know why you're here."

"Oh? Do tell."

"Have a look." With a sickly smile, Akemi pointed out into the city beneath them.

Sayaka looked, and almost fell over from the vertigo.

OoOoO

Mami is already waiting on the rooftop of her apartment complex, arms crossed and watching the city skyline. The restless, speedy tapping of an index finger against her arm is the only sign of the worry churning in her gut, or of her tight nerves, the same sort before a fight. She pulls her phone out briefly to double check the time again, just as she did less than a minute ago. She spots the girl she's waiting for loping in from nearby rooftops, on time and a few minutes early for once. Mami expected to wait.

Kyouko lands at the edge of the roof, as Mami stills the rapid tapping of her finger to keep a more composed front. The two study each other warily for a moment; for now, they're both in their everyday street clothes.

"It's been quite some time, Kyouko," Mami says, trying to keep a neutral tone.

"Yeah. Yeah, it has." Kyouko doesn't bother trying to keep the rough blend of guilt, anger, weariness, and apology out of her voice. It comes out sounding far older than a middle schooler should be able to manage. She takes a seat on a line of piping, sitting stiff; Mami remains standing. "How's hunting?"

"Plentiful." Curt.

"Same as always in this hellhole, then. Made any good cakes lately?"

"A few. I couldn't help but notice you in the halls at school."

"Yeah, finally got my ass dragged into the slammer. I even do homework sometimes."

The attempted banter is unnatural and forced, and they both know it. Mami doesn't want to chat, and when they were partners Kyouko was younger and not nearly as sarcastic as she was now. Mami can imagine the word "hellhole" coming out of the mouth of the Kyouko she remembers, at least when her temper was flaring up, but that Kyouko would have been sincerely ashamed of it once she calmed down. She was a girl who tried so hard to live up to the things her parents taught her, but looking back Kyouko already had the seeds of the girl she became.

"Mami…"

It's almost a plea, and Mami cuts right over it. "I think it'd be best if we go right to your reason for speaking with me," she says.

Kyouko huffs, and obligingly sets aside her hopes. "So there's this girl I'm working with now."

"You? That's unlike you."

"Yeah, well, I don't feel much like me nowadays anyway." Kyouko rocks about on her rigid seat. "But this girl, she wants to have a go at the Great Curse."

Mami's composed wall is the only thing that keeps her jaw from hanging open when her brain quickly snaps the pieces into place. "Miki? You're working with Miki Sayaka."

"Yeah."

" _Why_?"

Kyouko glowers up at Mami. She came here expecting at least half a cold shoulder, but if Mami goes after Sayaka too… "'Cause I felt like it, what's it to you?"

"She's reckless and heedless; I can't imagine you working with someone like her. You'd say she's too much a liability."

A snigger escapes Kyouko. "Well she was smart enough to let me come do the talking, she can't be all that terrible."

OoOoO

Sayaka caught herself on a chair, clutching her head with one hand. "What was _that_?"

"Me," Akemi said, too worn to enjoy Sayaka's shock. "Me and mine. But I can let you ride along while you're here in this place. I watch my domain, Miki."

"So you did know what they were up to."

Homura didn't reply. Sayaka shrugged, and moved around to sit in the chair, and perhaps dropped into it a little more heavily than she meant. "Well, that's fine. I mostly just came looking for you to make sure you were too busy to interrupt Mami and Kyouko's meeting yourself. Whatever you're hiding in the Great Curse, we're going to pry it out and trash it."

"So paranoid, Miki. I have no reason to interfere with puella magi attacking the Great Curse."

Sayaka snorted. "If you expect me to believe that…. Everything in this world of yours goes back to you somewhere along the line."

"It's an eyesore, nothing else. I would clear it out myself, but I can't be bothered for something so trivial."

"Alright, now I _know_ you're bullshitting me."

A pause, while Akemi took another sip. She glanced over the rest of the table, where a tea service waited. "I might as well offer you tea."

Sayaka didn't know how many enemies she'd made over her life, but this had to be the weirdest. She'd certainly never find a wraith offering her tea. "Sure, why not?"

OoOoO

"I'm quite serious, Kyouko. What's your scheme in this? You remember how difficult attacking the Great Curse was; it's only gotten worse. What could you possibly hope to gain by taking such risks when there's more than plenty safer hunting in the city?"

Kyouko spreads her arms out wide, as if in surrender. "I don't got an angle here, I swear. Sayaka wants a go at the Great Curse, so I'm doing what I can for her, that's it."

"Isn't this a little far to go for an expendable meat shield?" Her face is stony, but Mami's surprised at the accusations sliding out her mouth and leaping at Kyouko's face almost before her brain can process them. She spent so long mourning after she and Kyouko parted that she didn't expect _anger_ of all things when they finally meet again.

"It would be if that's what she is," Kyouko hissed. "But hey, lookit that, here I am doing it anyway!"

They stare at each other, testing the edges of their own grudges for sharpness.

"In any case," Mami says, breaking the silence, "I haven't the time to spare for risky strategies such as raiding the Great Curse at the moment. I'm busy enough hunting for grief cubes."

"So take a bucket of ours, me and Sayaka have loads." Kyouko shrugs. "Or just don't come with us if you can't stand my face that bad. I mean we'll take your help if you're willing but all we really need is getting to the thing without you sniping anyone's head off on the way there."

Mami shakes her head. "I've seen Miki fight and I've seen her poking her nose into danger. She keeps trying to cross my territory to enter the Great Curse alone, despite how thoroughly I explained to her that this was suicide. For her own safety, I'm not letting someone as reckless as her go near the Great Curse without backup.

"I _am_ backup," Kyouko insists.

"Backup that won't abandon her as soon as it's convenient." Once again, Mami can only listen to herself. She tightens her face against the admission.

"I'm not ditching Sayaka for anything!" Kyouko shouts. "I… I… hell!"

OoOoO

The calm with which Sayaka sipped her tea was admirable.

"Not at all worried about Kyouko?" Akemi asked.

Sayaka shrugged. "Nah, she's charming, she'll bring Mami around."

Akemi stared at her flatly. "Charming."

Sayaka nodded.

Akemi kept staring for a few seconds, before letting her head fall into her hand. "…she is, isn't she? I still don't know how that works. She swears at people, threatens them, and somehow becomes friends. That shouldn't work."

"So I'm pretty sure I'm going to regret asking this, but what the hell is that purple gunk?"

Akemi fixed Sayaka with a stare, suddenly focused and gears whirring behind her gaze. Sayaka tensed. "What?"

"…Perhaps the Incubator was right about that one single point," Akemi said, peering at her. "Maybe I should clear your head a little bit."

Homura reached for the tea service and an empty cup appeared in her reach. She dipped it into her own goblet, pushing it just below the surface of purple liquid to let a thin trickle of her drink pool into the tea cup. She offered it to Sayaka. "Would you like to find out?"

Sayaka leaned back.

Homura arched an eyebrow. "I'm sure you can bear this small a taste, Miki. It will do you some good. Where's your reckless courage?"

"Doesn't extend to taking drinks from suspicious people," Sayaka replied.

Homura shrugged minutely, pouring the tea cup's contents back into the goblet.

OoOoO

The part of Kyouko that watched her world crumble beneath her feet is screaming at her to run over and punch Mami's teeth in for daring to throw that in her face, but the part of her that kept her from despairing even through flame and loss is steadying her. Kyouko believes herself damaged goods with an unstable temper, but she's always been shrewder than that. _You hurt her something bad when you were thrashing around back then,_ she tells herself. _Pick a fight now and it's over._

She breaths, deep and slow. "Fine. Fine, I deserved that," she says, and tries to change the topic. "The fucking hell are you short on grief cubes for, anyway? Hunting's good and I can't imagine you're jobbing that bad against normal wraiths. You been going after shadows or something else stupid and expensive?"

For the first time in the conversation, Mami things of Nagisa, still healing, begging Mami to listen. "That's a private concern you needn't worry yourself about."

"Tch. Fine, whatever. What's it my business if you wanna go all suicidal on your own and then turn it down when someone else wants to team up for once?"

Mami starts to shoot back, but Kyouko raises a hand to cut her off. "Sorry, look, I take that back. I didn't come here to pick a fight or be a bastard, it just comes natural to me."

Mami almost shoots back that she wasn't the one who charged off on her own, Kyouko was, but remembers Nagisa's not-quite-deadweight hanging with arms around her neck, and squeezes her lips together instead.

Kyouko growls to herself. "I fucked you over, I get that. Wasn't in the best mind at the time, doesn't excuse it anyway. You don't wanna give me another shot at your back. I get that. But Sayaka, Sayaka's done jack all to you so far outside of some scuffles, so don't make her pay my bill with you. Yeah, I know she's reckless, and I know she's… shit, she's kinda screwed up, I know that."

Kyouko clenches her fingers into her hair, almost pulling loose her ponytail. She remembers the mad fury in Sayaka's eyes as she fights like a berserker. She remembers the constant dodges and evasions in conversation. She remembers Sayaka falling asleep in her arms, finally calm enough to rest. "She's got her secrets and she's got her damage. Maybe her wish messed her head up, I don't really know what her deal is. But she's a good kid, better than me. She's your kind of girl, alright? She's an idiot hero worse than you even. That's… that's why I stuck with her. I didn't wanna leave someone like her alone again. Once was stupid enough."

Kyouko looks up, bare regret shining in her eyes. Nothing even tries to slip out Mami's mouth this time; she takes a look at Kyouko, and realizes this isn't the girl who fought with her and walked out of her life anymore. Not the girl she used to know either. But someone both those Kyoukos could become.

Kyouko slaps her hands together, pleading. "So… so please, Mami. I don't have the right to ask anything out of you, but please. Just give her a chance, will you?"

Mami works her throat silently a moment before finding her voice. "…bring her by tonight," she says. "We'll… we'll talk then."

OoOoO

Sayaka leaned her chair back on its hind legs, smirking at Homura over her tea cup. "Well look at that, I'm getting my pass to raid the Great Curse after all."

"Hmm."

"Well, I'm mostly here to keep you out of Kyouko's hair, but there's actually one thing I want to hear from your mouth while I've got you here." Homura didn't reply, which Sayaka took as good enough to keep going. "What the hell did a devil like you have to do to get Madoka to like you so much?"

Homura stared at her. "Are you being serious?"

"You are the enemy." Sayaka leaned in, grin feral. "I arrived in this world certain of that, and nothing else. So what did you have to do to make her so fond someone like you in this little world of yours?"

Homura clenched her hands over her face, body shaking just visibly, but whether she was laughing or upset Sayaka couldn't tell. "You really are doubting everything, aren't you?" she asked, muffled.

"And whose fault is that, Akemi?"

Homura's eyes crept just above her fingertips, catching the violet light of her soul gem hanging from her earring. "I don't know why she cares for me so much. I've asked the same over and over."

That Sayaka didn't believe her was plain from her expression, and the look Homura shot her was pure venom. "Why ask, Miki, if you aren't going to believe the answer? I've already spent long enough begging you to listen me."

"Just thought I'd try," Sayaka said.

"Perhaps you should ask the Incubator," Homura said. "He remembers or knows most of how we got here."

It was Sayaka's turn to glare daggers, getting a tiny smirk out of Homura. They went back to their tea, finishing silently. Above them, a stony tomb hung silent and unnoticed.

OoOoO

Sayaka bounced on the balls of her feet while Kyouko rang the doorbell. Her twitchiness wasn't so noticeable while they were walking over here, but trying to hold still just left her vibrating in place.

"Cool it before you get me nervous too," Kyouko snapped at her.

"I'm not nervous."

"Right, and a deep sense of peace an' contentment leaves me buzzing in my shoes too."

"I'm _impatient_."

The door opened, cutting off further sniping. Mami inclined her head in greeting. "Kyouko, Miki. Come in."

"Sup, Mami," Kyouko said. "Mami, Sayaka; Sayaka, Mami."

"We've met," Mami reminded her.

"Yeah, but this time no one's going for the face." Kyouko shot Sayaka a look that plainly said, _'No going for the face.'_

 _'Don't know why you're on my case,'_ Sayaka sent back with telepathy. _'She's the one who always started shooting first.'_

 _'You don't have guns, Sayaka.'_

Sayaka ignored that in favor of holding up the gift Kyouko picked out. "We brought cake," she said aloud.

A few moments later, they were all seated around Mami's living room table with cake, tea, and slices of pears. They'd mostly ignored small talk in favor of silence while Mami served. "Now then, Sayaka," Mami began after they'd had a chance to taste the food and satisfy civility. "Kyouko tells me you want a shot at the Great Curse. I certainly understand the problems that thing causes and I'd be amenable to thinning the wraiths' numbers at the edges now that we have three of us together, but Kyouko also tells me you want to strike deeply at the center. Keeping in mind that the Curse has only gotten worse since Kyouko and I stopped keeping it in check, can you tell me what reason you have to insist on that?"

The delicately-worded challenge and its unspoken point that _Sayaka_ had never been inside the Curse didn't seem to faze her; a mysterious smile played around the corners of her mouth as she met Mami's gaze. "For one thing, I've got reason to believe a good look at the heart of the Great Curse could tell me what's damaged the Law of Cycles."

Kyouko choked on her tea. Mami's fork missed her cake. "What?" Mami asked.

OoOoO

The voices of the conversation in the living room were badly muffled and distant by the time they got to Nagisa, lying on her bed in her room hugging a Pyotr curled up on her chest. Sayaka already knew Mami was working with a younger puella magi, but Mami wanted Nagisa out of sight for the meeting anyway. No reason to give away how closely they were working together, or that Nagisa was badly wounded.

Nagisa didn't like seeing Mami suspicious and scared like this. It wasn't good for her.

"Don't forget." Okubyou circled the bed, always just outside Nagisa's sight. Pyotr growled at Okubyou and tried to scoot away in fear, getting nowhere because Nagisa held it tight; the Miss Akemi's doll didn't even acknowledge Nagisa's familiar. "Avoid being alone with Sayaka. Don't spill a word about the Law of Cycles, the old world, or about your own fiddly nature, little herald. These were Good-For-Nothing's commands."

A pause.

"In fact, little clowns should just stay put altogether. Calamity won't come knocking again if you stay out of its way."

"But I can't let them fight alone," Nagisa said to the ceiling.

"Good-For-Nothing's been happy to let you sit, and your golden keeper hasn't asked for you. They know better than you, so heed your betters."

"Miss Akemi told me to fight the Great Curse," Nagisa said, sullen, and curled around Pyotr and her mousey familiar's trembling warmth. And Madoka would definitely want her to, too. And Mami… Mami didn't want her pushing herself while she was hurt, but did she know Sayaka was a healer?

OoOoO

Kyouko was still coughing, so Sayaka absently rubbed her back. "What… what do you mean the Law of Cycles is _damaged_?" Mami demanded.

 _'Miki Sayaka knows quite a lot more than she reveals,'_ Kyubey said as it walked along the top of Mami's couch. _'Listening to her would be well worth your time even if she doesn't say how she knows.'_

Reactions to its appearance were varied and immediate. Sayaka barely kept the anger from contorting her face into a snarl; Kyouko turned off her body's coughing and grabbed Sayaka's hand to stop her from doing anything stupid. Mami cocked her head to the side and said, "Oh, there you are, Kyubey. Where have you been for the last few days?"

 _'I had matters to attend to, such as attempting to speak with Miki Sayaka.'_ It peered at the girl trying to control herself. _'Do you intend to throw swords here as well, Miki Sayaka?'_ it added, privately so only Sayaka could hear.

"Is she still being stubborn?" Mami's eyes flicked over to Sayaka. "Kyouko, did you know your partner won't hear a word of what Kyubey has to say?"

"Hey Mami," Kyouko interrupted, waving one hand. "Yeah, thing is, let's say I don't really blame Sayaka for that. I've seen some shit recently that makes me think the Incubator isn't completely level about what he wants."

"Such as?" Mami asked, but Kyouko was already standing, and grabbed Kyubey by the scruff of his neck.

"Later," she promised, and fixed Kyubey with a glare. "You, me, balcony. Now."

 _'My primary intent coming here was to speak with Miki Sayaka, so I would really prefer…'_

"And I'm her goddamn secretary." Kyouko pushed the sliding door to the balcony open and looked over at Sayaka and Mami. "You two, don't kill each other for a few minutes, mkay?"

She slid the door shut with her foot and tossed Kyubey, who landed on the railing and began preening; Mami's balcony faced the east with the tower blocking the western sun, so the dimming evening left Kyubey in shadow and its red eyes glittering even without catching any light. Kyouko leaned against the wall, hands jammed into her pockets and scowling at the creature. "You tried to get me pissed at Homura."

 _'I'm not sure how you think I would accomplish such a feat, since I wasn't present for any of your meetings with Akemi Homura.'_

"You put me on her trail telling me she knows about Sayaka, and you had reason to suspect the odds were if I tried swapping stories she'd throw it all back in my face. That specific enough for you?"

 _'To be fair,'_ Kyubey said, interrupting its cleaning to peer at her, _'Had you actually managed to pry useful information from her, I would have considered that a superior outcome.'_

"Tch, 'useful information,' you know where you can shove your useful information." Kyouko huffed, and reached one hand out to the sky from the balcony. The moon was out already, hanging low. "Her pain for Madoka's wellbeing, her world for Madoka's home, her desire for Madoka's smile. Hey, Incubator. You wanna explain what your boss's big deal with Pinkie is?"

 _'I don't consider any puella magi my 'boss,' as you put it. I work toward my own ends, as you girls work toward your own goals by your own means.'_

"Yeah, no, try the other one. I heard more than enough. You're working for Homura, and it's got you ticked. What's she got on you?"

Kyubey stopped and stared at her, seemingly completely focused on her for the first time this conversation. _'Just as your friend Miki Sayaka has things she must conceal, please understand I too have sharp restrictions on what I am or am not capable of saying. I've fallen into a situation no rational being would want._

"So back when I was spying on you and Twintails, you said something about an isolation field experiment. Fucked her head up good, you made it sound like." Kyouko grinned, fang showing. "Did you sow this harvest?"

Kyubey looked away.

"Well, whatever. I'm keeping you away from Sayaka for now, on account of she wants to spit you on a sword and roast marshmallows over a campfire. Whatever you've got for her, tell it here and I'll decide if I wanna pass it on."

 _'I believe I've already explained there are some things I'm simply unable to say.'_

"Boohoo, then."

The way Kyubey's tail stiffened managed to convey irritation far better than its plastic face ever would. _'You, even knowing that you lack a complete understanding of the situation, are deliberately standing in the way of information being passed to your allies.'_

"Yeah, well, three people here know what the hell's going on. Sayaka wants to kill you on sight, and she dances DDR with me. Homura's probably obsessed, but she gets some regard from Sayaka and Pinkie anyway, and she's got you… I don't know, contained or something. You're the third. I'll stick with them on this."

 _'You puella magi were much easier to deal with when you were inherently disposable,'_ Kyubey said.

Kyouko jabbed a finger toward the Incubator. "See, that? That's what I'm talking about. So you going to give us any info on the Great Curse before we head in there, O support crew of puella magi? From how you jumped in and backed up Sayaka on the Law of Cycles, I'm guessing you want us going after the Curse too."

 _'Of course. There's much you can learn inside the Great Curse. The wraith concentrations are high enough that I've not been able to get a body into the deepest parts of its terrain to do a thorough investigation myself, but I do have estimates of the opposition you'll face.'_

"Lovely." Kyouko lifted Kyubey off the railing. "We'll head back to the others, then." She stopped as she was reaching for the door handle, and peered through the glass at the group around the table. "Who's that?"

OoOoO

 _'Sayaka! Don't let Mami know I'm talking to you!'_

Sayaka was luckier than Kyouko and not drinking tea, and thus did not choke on it. But she did drop the cup.

"Whoops, clumsy me," she said, laughing, and grabbed a napkin for the spill. "Cup doesn't look hurt though, good thing."

"Don't worry yourself over it, I'll find a cloth," Mami said, standing and leaving the table.

 _'Sayaka? Are you okay?'_

 _'I recognize your voice,'_ Sayaka sent back. _'Mami's new trainee, the one who wanted to talk to me about Madoka. Where are you? What do you know?'_

 _'Nothing! I don't know anything, I just want to help with the Great Curse but Mami won't let me because I got a tiny bit cut in half fighting a shadow but you can fix that only please don't tell her I told you that because she wanted me to stay out of this and she'll be all disappointed at me!'_

Mami returned to the table and pressed a damp cloth over what was left of the spilled tea. "Here, this should take care of it nicely."

 _'Who are you?'_

 _'Just a girl who wants to help!'_

Just a girl Akemi saw the need to run off, more like. But they weren't getting anywhere like this. "Hey Mami, so you said you'd raid the Great Curse with three, but not alone. Wouldn't four be even better? What about that new puella magi you had with you last time?"

Something definitely shifted in Mami's stance at that; it was subtle, but Sayaka could see her closing off, hardening the smile into something less gracious as she mopped up the tea. "She's much too inexperienced to come on this little adventure of yours. As I've tried to tell you, the Great Curse is not a playground."

"Is that the only reason?"

"Yes, it certainly is."

 _'Mami, Mami,'_ Nagisa's voice scrambled in her head, _'How's the meeting going? Are you all getting along?'_

Mami stifled a minute sigh. "Kindly give me just a moment, Sayaka?" She got up from the table again, leaving Sayaka to obligingly start on another slice of cake, and moved away so the other girl couldn't watch her face while she talked to her junior. _'Nagisa,'_ Mami sent in her stern big sister voice, _'Did you tell Sayaka you're here?'_

 _'N-no, of course not! Why would I do that? I'm just lying here bored with Ok—just staring at the ceiling. I haven't been talking to Sayaka!'_ Even if Nagisa weren't such a terrible liar, her sudden surge in anxiety came jangling down their connection and rattled about Mami's head. That child's control over telepathy was not finely tuned.

 _'Nagisa, you shouldn't trust so quickly. Not everyone is reliable.'_

 _'Maaaaaaaami, don't be so scared of them. They just want to help! Sayaka won't hurt me or try to push you around if she knows I'm here, I already know I can trust her.'_

Mami bit her lip. The way Nagisa learned so quickly, her natural talent at combat, the way her knowledge seemed so… mismatched, like a complete trainee on things like wraiths but already so developed on magic, the way she adapted her powers on the fly like a skilled veteran…. And earlier today, Nagisa said she knew a girl who saved her and who wanted puella magi to work together. Was that girl the reason Nagisa contracted? Where was she now? _'Nagisa. How long were you puella magi before I found you?'_

The hesitation was obvious even without their empathic link. _'It doesn't matter.'_

 _'Nagisa, I need you to tell me this.'_

 _'…it's a secret. 'm sorry Mami.'_

No. No no no. Not again, not another betrayal—

 _'Mami?'_

Some of Mami's control over her own telepathy must have been slipping, because the wave of emotion that flowed out from Nagisa was overwhelming with its concern and panic and desperate affection. _'Mami, I'm not here to hurt you, I really really promise I'm not. Please don't be scared of me, Mami!'_

Mami took a shuddering breath to steady herself before replying. _'First Sayaka and Kyubey are keeping secrets, now you—what on earth is going on?'_

 _'I promised not to tell anyone. 'm sorry.'_ She could feel it, too—Nagisa felt almost sick with worry. _'But that doesn't mean anything! Just 'cause someone can't say everything they want to or has to keep secrets doesn't mean they're out to get you. I love you, Mami! I never had a big sister, but I always wanted one. I want to stay with you. Please please don't be scared of me.'_

…she really was just a child, wasn't she? Uncontrolled and genuine and tripping over herself in a rush to reassure.

"I've got healing power, if that means anything to you," Sayaka said from the table. "It's up for grabs, even if she doesn't come with us."

Mami checked herself and turned back around. Sayaka had started mashing her cake up with her fork at some point, looking like she was tense with nerves too. Nagisa was almost certainly talking to Sayaka earlier today. How much longer before that? Was Sayaka the girl who saved Nagisa and wanted puella magi to work together? Was Nagisa sent here to befriend Mami in the first place so Sayaka could get to the Great Curse? No, that couldn't be it. If Sayaka was that subtle and patient, Mami wouldn't have needed to clash with her in the first place.

But if it was something like that, if Nagisa really was sent here, would Mami really mind, as long as her new friend didn't leave?

"R-right," Mami said, straightening up. "There's no point hiding her if she's already spoken with you. Follow me, then."

OoOoO

Okubyou flitted out of sight and Pyotr tumbled back into the labyrinth, and then Nagisa's heart leapt into her throat as the door swung open—or it would've, if her heart was actually beating. But the door swung open anyway, revealing Sayaka and a very strained-looking Mami. She looked… not freaking out, though? That was good? But sad and unhappy. She needed huggles, soon.

"Nagisa? Sayaka is here to heal you," Mami said.

Sayaka approached the bed, Mami hovering anxiously just behind her keeping a sharp eye on everything. "Hey. Miki Sayaka," she said.

"Momoe Nagisa," she replied, attempting a little half-flop that could under the right lighting while squinting be mistaken for a bow from bed.

 _'Akemi got you first, didn't she? That's why you won't talk about whatever you were trying to tell me the first time. She's got one of those dolls of hers watching you too.'_

Nagisa sank as far as she could into her pillows. _'…'m sorry.'_

Sayaka shook her head, looking stressed. _'Don't worry about it.'_ She offered a hand, and Nagisa clasped it with her own.

Magic rushed through her like a cold brook, tingling her nerves and swooshing around her bones and muscles and filling up her lax veins. Nagisa gasped as real feeling set her limbs burning with needles for the first time in almost a week. "You really got messed up, didn't you?" Sayaka muttered. "Mami, start stripping out the ribbon bandages."

So big was the missing chunk of Nagisa's body that the bandages weren't just surface wraps. They were actually stuffing the destroyed gap in her body to replace lost volume and hold her together while they regrew the bits and pieces that had been there. Now Mami dispelled lines and chunks of ribbons as her body grew back into the space at a silly rate under Sayaka's care.

The ribbons fell away, leaving pink unbroken skin behind. Nagisa suddenly felt like an inflating balloon as the magic pushed her body to churn out blood, filling up her veins to replace all that she'd lost. From Mami's gasp and Sayaka's satisfied grin, she probably looked a lot less corpsey, too. Then a final spark ran through her, and she felt a sensation she'd almost forgotten: _dub-thub, dub-thub, dub-thub_. She pressed her hands over her chest and just spent a moment feeling the beating of her heart against her ribcage.

"Say thank you, Nagisa," Mami said, but it was automatic and did nothing to hide her amazement.

Nagisa got up from the bed, her feet and legs taking her weight easily without her magic having to rush in to brace her and hold her upright. Good. She had work to do, and about darn time! "Thank you!" she said, bowing properly to Sayaka. Then, she turned to her dearest friend. "Mami?"

"Yes?"

Nagisa's eyes grew very wide. "I haven't eaten in _forever_."

Mami laughed, and let herself get dragged back to the living room table as fast as Nagisa could manage. When Kyouko wandered back in from the balcony a few minutes later with Kyubey dangling from one hand, she found Sayaka sipping tea with a smug look on her face and Nagisa firmly ensconced on Mami's lap, shoving slices of pear and cake down her throat as fast as she could chew.

"So who's the newbie?" Kyouko asked.

Clown, caterpillar, and angel. Nagisa smiled, and swallowed her mouthful. "I'm just Mami's cute little student!"

OoOoO

They waited at the riverbank.

The miasma of the Great Curse hung brooding over the waters. It was broad daylight in the middle of the afternoon, but they wouldn't have guessed it facing the river; the living darkness swelled out so far and up so high as to swallow the light in the sky. Unlike most miasmas, the sun's gaze could not burn away this mist. Even at this distance, the pain and hunger pushing off it was enough to overwhelm their magical senses; it was like trying to stand against a flood of filth-slick water.

It was Saturday afternoon now; they'd spent the rest of the week hunting wraiths together in the city to work out the kinks in their teamwork. The four of them meshed well, and fought as if they'd been together far longer. Right now, it didn't seem like nearly enough.

"The thing's worse than I remember," Kyouko muttered.

Mami nodded. "As I said."

"How do we get to it? We don't swim, do we?" Nagisa asked. She was pale, but also clenched her jaw and had a hard, determined look as she stared out over the river.

"We jump," Mami said. "It's far out, but not out of range for a strong leap from puella magi. There's terrain to land on once we're in the Curse itself."

"Then let's move already." Sayaka glared at the thing. "It's not going to roll out a red carpet and invite us in."

She pulled on her magic, tasting of the swollen ocean tides. It crashed up within her, and she was filled with abyssal blue light and the crescendo of music. Her street clothes fell away and the sanctified blue cloth and leather of a duelist's uniform replaced them, regal white cloak billowing behind her.  
She grasped a blade in each hand, eager and strained for battle; a schoolgirl vanished, and in her place stood a restless errant knight.

Kyouko's magic pulsed next, like a crackling flame and a fine-edged knife. Heavenly light met the darkness of the earth, both touching where she stood. In a burst of crimson, the flowing garments of a holy warrior adorned her. Her hair and the skirts of her robe spun about her as she twisted with the spear that formed in her hand. A street rat vanished, and in her place stood a penitent champion.

Five-petal yellow flowers bloomed, stunning in their delicate beauty and fraught with thorns, scented with tea and gunpowder. A golden light descended upon Mami as ribbons sprang out to swathe and dress her. Beret and plume, corset and skirt, ribbons and boots, she stood ready in a gunner's outfit. A lonely girl vanished, and in her place stood a veteran soldier.

Nagisa's magic tasted of proffered cake and sweets, but drifting behind the frosting waited timeless dreams no other could grasp. A soft lavender light radiated from her, and she was at once the hungering caterpillar, the jester clown of the sacred court, and the soft child. Her cat-eared hood, pink mantle, poofed shorts, and dark leggings formed on her, the clothing of a messenger, as her long white hair fanned behind her. A child vanished, and in her place stood an angel adrift.

"Oh, before we go!" Nagisa stuck her hands behind her back, rattled her labyrinth a little, and caught what fell out. She stuck her hands back out in front of her and opened them. "Good luck chocolates for everyone!"

"Ah, Nagisa, I don't think now is… quite the time?" Mami said.

As she spoke, Kyouko snapped one up immediately and started munching on it. "You I like, kid. You know what the important things are. Hey, this is pretty good."

Nagisa stuck her hands out to Mami and Sayaka. "If you have to go have a big fight, are you going to do better with good luck chocolate or without? With good luck chocolate, right? That should be obvious!"

"They've got like some kinda pudding in the middle," Kyouko added from the side. "Sayakaaaa, I think it's butterscotch!"

Mami and Sayaka took their chocolates and ate. "Okay, that is tasty," Sayaka admitted. "…where did you even get these?" Nagisa just grinned.

"Well then, we'll be on our way," Mami said. "Follow my jump as we go in. Nagisa and I will use our range to clear a landing space if we have to."

They took one last look at the writhing mists across the river, distant but not quite out of range. They could have been imagining it, but all four puella magi felt like the tendrils of mist were reaching out and grasping hungrily at them, even at this distance.

Mami jumped, soaring into the darkened air above the river, and the others followed.

OoOoO

Madoka's attention kept drifting away from the game, which was pretty impressive considering how insistent her playmate was.

"Maroka! Play, Maroka!" Tatsuya waved a building block around in front of her face, bopping her arm with his other hand. "Maroka!"

"Oh, I'm sorry!" Madoka smiled and went back to shoring up the swaying block tower her brother was building. He would make it higher, she would straighten or add just enough blocks to keep it from falling over quite yet. "Let's make this one reach the ceiling, okay Takkun?"

Tatsuya plopped another block on top of the tower—it was almost up to Madoka's head while she was sitting down—but then stared at his big sister instead of reaching for another block. "Maroka? Where's Dolly?"

"I don't know. Maybe she was too busy to come play." She was worried about Manuke. Madoka had called for Manuke a few times in the days since hearing her fairy tale, and she always popped up diligently out of nowhere. They hadn't done much, just played card games at Madoka's house and went for another round of ice cream, but she felt like Manuke probably needed some time away from her sisters. Tatsuya wandered in on them playing Go Fish one day and immediately took to Dolly.

Manuke hadn't come today when Madoka called out for her. Maybe she was just busy, but maybe Homura stopped her from coming. Homura was definitely watching Sayaka with Usotsuki; why not Madoka too? And Reiketsu sounded like Homura wouldn't like Manuke telling her anything important… which was why she hadn't asked her new friend anything else. But maybe that didn't matter. She should try finding out of Manuke was in trouble or not. But that would mean facing Homura again.

"Maroka!" Tatsuya bopped her arm again. "Maroka, build more! It needs real high!"

"Ehihi, I'm spacing out today, aren't I?" Madoka giggled at herself for Tatsuya's benefit and grabbed another block to slide into a weak spot two-thirds the way up the tower.

Her hand slipped and knocked the whole tower over when a deep rumble crashed over the house. She couldn't hear it and the house wasn't shaking, but it felt like thunder shaking inside her bones. Tatsuya ignored the fallen blocks, suddenly aware something was wrong with his big sister. "Maroka?"

Magic. That's what it was. She wasn't supposed to have strong magic or sharp senses, but she could feel a little, and this must have been as strong as an earthquake to rattle her so. She didn't hear her brother's questions, and staggered over to the window. She could feel it, somewhere off in the east part of the city. The sky was darkening. Storm clouds gathered and spread, but not yet enough to account for the loss of light. The sky was simply darker, as if something was choking the sun.

Another rumble of magic made her knees weak; she let her weight fall heavily onto the window sill. Her friends were out there. She didn't know what they were doing, but it was dangerous. And she couldn't do anything for them.

Far above the city, another girl watched the same storm brewing. Homura sat at her table on the edge of the cliffs overlooking Mitakihara. The wind-tossed umbrella atop the table didn't do much as the rain began to fall, but Homura didn't seem to mind as she kept her gaze fixed on the Great Curse below. Two Clara dolls sat with her, chairs turned to watch the spectacle as well.

The first shook her head with mock regret, chuckling freely as she spun her cup of tea in circles. Between her stark black-and-white hat and mantle, her long gray dress, and the black leggings beneath, she was swathed head to toe. The only skin Nekura showed was her face and the fingers poking out her voluminous sleeves as she waved dismissively. "They'll not amount to anything, you know this already, Good-For-Nothing. Stop putting any hope in these fools and take care of matters yourself. Haven't you learned that lesson already?"

Ibari wore a tunic, shorts, and leggings for freer movement and her short-chopped blond hair sat loose. She clenched a spear tight in one hand; her eyes burned with stern red light. "She's right." Ibari did not take her eyes off the city. "No puella magi slew Walpurgisnacht; no puella magi will slay this. Only a goddess."

"Perhaps." Homura ran a finger along her tea cup's rim. "I'll give them a chance; it can't hurt."

OoOoO

A hail of musket fire so thick it became artillery burst over the few wraiths in their landing zone, matching the roll of thunder beginning to seep in from the outside world; those that didn't die to Mami's barrage fell to the explosions that rippled outward when Nagisa's bubbles hit next. Mami landed, the others after her, and they moved.

 _'Sayaka, Kyouko, in front on either side,'_ Mami ordered. _'Nagisa, behind and between you two. Clear the way. I'll guard the rear.'_

Dark mist roiled beneath their feet, shifting treacherously yet somehow remaining dense enough to run on. This mist stretched out into a plain before them, arcing out in a wide ring that formed the outer edge of the terrain. A multitude of wraiths drifted in lines that followed the curve of the plain, circling the heart in procession, swaying and groaning in time. In the distance, closer to the center, a vast wall of darkness rose up before them. A sickly dying light sank through the ceiling of the miasma far above, barely illuminating anything and growing darker as the storm outside thickened; the wan yellow glow of the wraiths' magic and the vibrant shine of the girls' soul gems did more to illuminate the battle as it was joined.

Nagisa kept a stream of bubbles flowing ahead of them as she ran, bursting into the nearest line of wraiths and sending them staggering. The flashing blades of Sayaka and Kyouko struck next, biting into head and neck and core with deep, lightning-fast slashes while the wraiths still reeled. Bursts of white pixelation flew all around them as they darted back and forth across the front and the flanks, taking advantage of the weaknesses opened by Nagisa's blasts.

Mami came up at the rear, spinning in every direction even as she kept up with the others' sprint, feet barely touching the ground. The first front of the wraiths was buckling under Sayaka, Kyouko, and Nagisa's attack, but wraiths to either side were free to act. Or they would have been, if Mami hadn't been spinning four or five muskets out of ribbons at a time and snapping off shots at everything that looked like a threat.  
Dozens of wraiths tried moving up to flank them, and they fell back bellowing in pain as Mami's rapid work peppered their lines with stinging musket-shot.

 _'They don't go down so easy.'_  
Kyouko, as she dodged under a wraith's swiping arm and rammed her spear up into its center of mass. _'Tougher, hold together longer than normal wraiths.'_ The wraith died slowly, trying to trample her as its form held together; she let go of the spear and leapt away, forming another weapon and letting the first dissolve with her enemy.

 _'These ones spent a long time feeding on the negative energy in the Great Curse,'_ Mami guessed. _'We never should have let them alone this long.'_

The four were fast and struck hard, but they were a knife against an army. Behind the buckling front, rows and rows of wraiths now stopped their procession and turned toward the intruders, robed arms stretching to the sky.

 _'We can't fight all these!'_ Nagisa, shock in her mental voice even as she kept forcing the team forward with her stream of bubbles.

 _'We're not going to try.'_ Mami. _'We move quickly, don't get bogged down, engage what's in front of us, and refuse to let the others catch up to attack from all sides at once. We're faster than they are by far. You're doing so well, Nagisa, keep it up!'_

As they got closer, a few risked glances upward told them more about the wall of darkness rising up behind the wraiths closer to the center of the Curse. It wasn't solid, as it seemed at a distance; massive columns and mounds made of the same dense mist as the ground rose up like markers in a giants' graveyard. They were scattered unevenly, clumping together to leave twisting paths through the tomblike mountains.

 _'What's in there?'_ Sayaka asked.

 _'Dunno, Mami 'n me never made it in,'_ Kyouko sent back.

 _'H-hey, what's that?'_ Nagisa, alarmed.

Sick yellow light gathered behind the wraiths at the front as though someone had set up spotlights behind them, filtering around their robes. Mami was fastest on the uptake. _'JUMP!'_

The front line of wraiths disintegrated as a wave of energy blasts tore through them from behind and came rushing on, but the girls were already in the air.

 _'Holy shit, they're shooting through their own guys!'_ Kyouko sent.

 _'Incoming!'_ Sayaka sent at a scream. Beneath them, the host's raised hands gathered a thousand points of light.

Mami's ribbons snapped out to the other three and pulled them closer to her. _'Kyouko, shield!'_ Lines of chains spun out from Kyouko, weaving and interlocking with the ribbons Mami spun out just as fast; a red-gold half-sphere of chains and hardened ribbons coalesced beneath the girls between them and the wraiths just as the sky bloomed with light from a thousand magic blasts. The shield held firm against the first half-dozen hits, then cracked and frayed, then shattered. Most of the blasts tore through the shield's remnants unimpeded, ripping through everything in their path…

…and completely missed the winding black streak that shot out from behind the shield. Candy-colored polka dots rippled along its surface as the black streak flew across the sky. It looked like dense dark bubbles forming in sequence rather than a solid mass moving continuously, and it twisted and spiraled away with an erratic, jerky path as the fastest wraiths began a second barrage. Mami, Sayaka, and Kyouko clung to the front, pushed along as the stream billowed forward.

 _'Nagisa! What is this?'_ Mami asked, not missing a beat as she kept spawning muskets to fire below.

 _'I just figured it out 'cause I didn't wanna get splatted,'_ Nagisa replied. In this form, anyway. She could fly like this as Bebe—she used it to run from Miss Akemi back inside Homulilly's labyrinth, when Miss Akemi thought Bebe was the one to blame—but she hadn't worked out how to do it without shifting to her witch self.

 _'Sounds like awesome motivation to me,'_ Kyouko added.

 _'We can't stay here on the firing range,'_ Sayaka sent. _'We need to go forward! We'll have cover in that mist ahead.'_

 _'Agreed,'_ Mami sent as she eyed the slender mountains of dark mist ahead. Wraiths still wound through the paths below and perched on the tops of the columns and crawled over the lower mounds, but it wouldn't leave them exposed to the entire army of wraiths. _'Kyouko, can you make the two of us invisible while moving?'_

 _'Yeah. Yeah, I see what you're thinking. I can manage it long enough.'_ Fierce amusement in Kyouko's mental voice. _'Let's do this.'_ Kyouko drew on her illusion magic, and she and Mami leapt up from Nagisa's winding path and flickered out of sight.

 _'We should draw fire,'_ Sayaka sent to Nagisa. _'Strafe those mist things!'_

 _'Right!'_ Nagisa corkscrewed and dodged, winding closer to the walls and towers of mist. Sayaka flung swords like flying buzzsaws at the wraiths as they flew by, most sinking into the mist uselessly but some biting into targets. More wraiths flowed forward to crowd at the areas closest to Nagisa's flight path, taking shots that Nagisa stayed just ahead of. Then, although no signal was given, Nagisa and Sayaka veered away from the towers an instant before a voice rang out.

"Tiro…"

Kyouko's veil of invisibility fell away, revealing Mami and Kyouko midair, the golden gunner steadying a cannon three times her length.

"FINALE!"

The wraiths atop the shadowy columns had clumped together for the best firing positions; Mami took the opportunity to forcibly notify them they were also clumped together for best targeting position.

Nagisa swept up Kyouko and Mami as soon as the blast stopped ringing, and the four of them landed on a column of mist broad enough to hold half a dozen wraiths. It was now empty except for them, and so were all the columns immediately around them. It was behind a second taller column that blocked its view to the plain of wraiths, giving them a moment to rest.

Nagisa collapsed to her knees as soon as the billowing black and polka-dot magic dissipated. "Mou, that was terrifying! We almost died! I never dodged that fast in my life."

Mami, eyes clenched shut, looked strained until she pulled out a fistful of grief cubes and pressed them to the gem on her beret with a slow sigh of relief. "That… was the largest Tiro Finale I've ever shot," she muttered, before smiling kindly at Nagisa. "You did very well, Nagisa. We likely wouldn't have made it out if you hadn't reacted so quickly."

"Think you could pull that again if you had to?" Kyouko asked. "Dodging fire flying over the field again, I mean."

"We're not turning back right now, we just got past the outer line! We haven't even done anything yet!" Sayaka snapped.

"Hey, just keeping our options open," Kyouko said, hands up.

"Kyouko's right," Mami said. "Opposition is already worse than we expected, and sprinting our way through the crowd is impossible if the wraiths are willing to kill each other to bombard us. If we run up against an obstacle we can't beat or go around, it's best to already know our options for retreat." Sayaka frowned, but didn't object further.

Nagisa fidgeted. "Um… I could try? But we were almost here already when I started flying, and now the wraiths know I can. I don't think I want to fly back over across the whole plain unless we have to."

Mami nodded. "Alright. At the least, we can stay in cover until we find the weakest point to punch through if we need to retreat. For now, everyone cleanse and we'll go deeper into the Curse."

OoOoO

After their quick rest, they moved again before the wraiths found them. The columns and mounds were all of different heights, giving uneven lines of sight no matter where they stood. Deep twisting paths cut through the terrain like riverbeds hundreds of feet below the highest columns. But the ground paths were filled with an ominous-looking miasma that seemed full of shifting figures and no one wanted to go down to check if they were wraiths, and the tallest columns seemed too open when everything they expected to meet would be shooting at them, so they stayed on the top of columns about halfway up to keep some lines of sight blocked.

As soon as they left their landing area, they found the wraiths perched waiting for them and ready to unleash their magic.

Nagisa raised her trumpet and blew a stream of explosive bubbles, Sayaka and Kyouko leapt out in different directions to tackle two sets of wraiths, and Mami—even as she twirled muskets from ribbons and sent six cracking at every nearest target, the oldest veteran among them immediately understood that the wraiths had just won.

A wraith nearly knocked Sayaka off the column as she came in to land; she twisted around its swiping arm mid-jump, rebounded off the ground, and rammed a sword through its body with her full weight as she leapt into it. She jumped away and spawned a new sword as the wraith staggered and groaned, but did not fall. _'Nagisa, keep them stunned, will you?'_

 _'I'm trying!'_ Nagisa wailed. _'There are too many of them!'_

No. Numbers weren't the problem. There were fewer wraiths here than in the plain, but they were also spread out. When they were sprinting through the dense crowd on the plain, Nagisa's slow-moving bubbles could stun masses of wraiths just by focusing on the ones clumped in a tight arc close in front of their group. Here, where most of their battleground was empty air, their enemies were in smaller groups spread out at longer distances. Nagisa couldn't keep them all blasted.

 _'Lead your jumps with thrown swords or spears before you land to keep them off balance if Nagisa can't hit your wraiths,'_ Mami ordered. _'And try to stay together as much as you can. I'll help Nagisa.'_ And she leapt into the air, in a deliberately high wide arc, throwing out twice as many muskets as before and burning extra magic to twist her direction mid-jump to dodge the fire she drew. She kept firing at the wraiths behind and to the side of their group, but added Nagisa's front arc to her target list. She needed to hit every opponent in every direction; if she and Nagisa couldn't keep everything in range stunned, they'd get cut down.

 _'We're too damn far apart!' Sayaka, get back here!_ Kyouko, as she rode a spear onto a wraith's face.

 _'I know!'_ Sayaka shouted, landing on a tower that was almost ten seconds away by Nagisa's bubble speed. _'But these ones had a clear shot at us.'_

It wasn't lack of watching each other and coordinating that kept them scattered; again, distance worked against them. They had to respond to the wraiths attacking them from the greater distance, or be slowly overwhelmed. Wraiths flowed over and around the columns of mist to join the fray, and everytime a girl leaped to a new column her lines of sight shifted to reveal yet another swarm of wraiths waiting atop yet another vantage point. The way the Great Curse's miasma pounded at them still made their magical senses almost useless; maybe Mami'd been wrong about there being fewer wraiths in this part of the Curse, just fewer that could reach them at one time.

 _'We may have to drop to the ground,'_ Mami told the others.

 _'But, but won't they shoot us through their friends again? Those look like wraiths down there, and there's nowhere to dodge!'_ Nagisa sounded panicked.

 _'We'll lose if we continue as we are,'_ Mami warned. _'We're not sure what's down there, but a gamble could be better than staying up here waiting to—'_

The top of a tower exploded, sending ropy mist-debris raining below as three wraiths rose up from the broken crown. Nagisa, who was mid-leap toward what was an empty tower just a second go, only had time to shriek before tumbling into the middle of them. _'Mami, help!'_

She was in the wrong position—she'd thought Nagisa had been clear. She spun around for a better shot as a wraith's heavy arm struck Nagisa, knocking her flat. She spun up a cannon as the wraiths' hands began to glow, but she wasn't going to make it, _she wasn't going to make it_. She fired anyway, too late at this distance.

At the same instant she fired, one wraith bellowed in pain as a spear rammed into its side, but didn't lose its charged magic. Kyouko came rocketing in from the side and knocked Nagisa out of the path with a kick. The wraiths fired. Three blasts crashed into the wall of chains Kyouko desperately threw out.

She'd been so scared of Kyouko, so certain she was offering an olive branch for her own ends. Kyouko had been wounded, yes, driven mad years ago by the pain of her family's deaths and the collapse of her faith in a world that was worth fighting for, but that didn't make it hurt any less when she disappeared to Kazamino after she and Mami fought. It didn't erase the anger in Kyouko's eyes when she swore she'd never believe again and never reach out to another person.

Kyouko's chain wall broke.

Mami's cannon struck, annihilating two wraiths, including the one impaled by Kyouko's spear. Nagisa screamed Kyouko's name, and dove as the last wraith's arm came down. A hail of musket fire staggered it as Nagisa rolled to her feet with something bundled in her arms, leaping away from the tower. _'Sayaka! SAYAKA!'_

Mami jumped after her, trying to clear a path. _'Nagisa, wait! You're moving too fast!'_

OoOoO

She'd let herself be drawn away from the others. Every time she moved to bring the next group into reach of her blades, there was always one more swarm just close enough to blast her if she didn't do something about them, and more closing in behind her. Damn it!

There were three swarms in range to threaten her, two on adjacent columns and one more across a gap from the others. Stay loose, stay free. They couldn't hit what they couldn't trap. Wraiths looked big and intimidating, but one on one a puella magi would win every time, so she just had to not let them use their numbers.

It was a good thing battle cleared her head. It was simple. No false past, no rigged future. Only the moment, and what she knew she needed to do. She launched into the first of the two paired groups, ramming her sword through the closest wraith's head and leaping away before she could get bogged down in the middle. The wraiths inside the Great Curse were stronger and sturdier than others, but a sword through the head was still enough. It slowly crumpled and burst into pixelation as she struck again at the far edge of the swarm where the other two swarms would have to shoot through their friends to hit her.

The other swarms obliged; a barrage of pale yellow light burst over the wraiths as she danced between them with flashing blades. She used her enemies as cover, but she also had less room and time to dodge; the two nearest wraiths crumbled into pixels from friendly fire as a lucky blast managed to weave through the crowd and hit her full on before she saw it coming. She tumbled over the solid mist from the blow, healing magic already going to work forcing her broken legs into shape and regenerating her charred skin. They were definitely stronger.

She needed to finish this quickly, then.

The first group was all but destroyed, by blade or friendly fire; she flung a sword that struck the head of a wounded wraith, then sprinted past the last survivor and rammed a sword through its neck before launching herself to the next swarm on the nearest tower. She crashed into the lead wraith and rammed a sword in each hand deep into its body.

The beast swayed from the pain of her swords, but didn't fall and didn't disintegrate.

With a bellow, it snapped its enormous arms around her and squeezed before she could kick off from its bulk. Off guard and caught, Sayaka screamed. She couldn't move her arms to spawn and grip another sword. A burst of yellow light exploded around them as the third group fired. The wraith holding her groaned from the attack, but still stood.

 _'Sayaka! SAYAKA!'_

She couldn't wait for the thing to die from friendly fire. That blast hit her too, and her ribs were giving way under the pressure. Shut off the pain, shut off the feel of her body breaking. Keep moving, keep living, keep killing. With a sky-ripping shriek, Sayaka borrowed one of Kyouko's tricks and forced phantom blades out her soul gem on her navel. A dozen swords of abyssal blue light tore through the wraith's back; it toppled and died.

She landed on her feet, instinctively grabbing the wraith's cubes and forcing them to her gem, then sprung at the rest with a berserker's howl ripping from her throat. She crashed like a tsunami into the rest of the group, armed with a single sword as tall as her. So the filthy monsters weren't dying when she rammed swords through their body anymore. They'd still find it hard to fight on when she cut them in half.

 _'Sayaka, where are you?'_

Her rage spilled over into the monsters. Fury overwhelmed finesse. The wraiths rushed her for the chance of landing a blow, she met them head on with flashing sword. They tried to grab her, she rammed a dozen blades out her gem and tore them apart. They blasted her with a lucky strike, she forced her body to heal by the time she rolled to her feet. Shattered limbs only slowed her. Guarding her gem was the only concession to defense Sayaka made. She was an angel of death among her foes, and they flocked to die on her blade with a single-mindedness that matched her own.

 _'Sayaka, what are you doing? Kyouko needs you!'_

She felt it pulsing, something far off in the center of the miasma. Even over the pounding of so much negative energy clouding her senses, she knew it was watching her. It felt her fury, the anger that burned in her soul. It felt her fury, and beat in time. She cut down its monstrous children, ending the last of the second swarm, and it looked on with approval. Sayaka heard herself laughing. This is what she wanted, wasn't it? To cut loose, to _fight_ , this was what she couldn't do all along in this world where her broken head couldn't tell one path from another.

Bubbles exploded over the third group, cutting off their stream of pale yellow blasts. A young girl with cat ears and a trumpet landed next to her; Sayaka brought her wavering sword up. She knew this girl, didn't she? She was sure she knew this girl. The girl didn't wait for Sayaka to muddle through; a bundle wrapped in red cloth shoved into her arms. Sayaka's brain stopped when she recognized the sorry trail of crimson hair falling from her arms.

 _'Ow,'_ Kyouko sent.

Explosions and gunfire washed over her without origin or reason; Sayaka's world narrowed down to Kyouko as she pushed her magic into the shattered body in her arms. One leg gone, the other useless. Arms, pulled tight to guard her soul gem just below her neck, wrapped in a sheath of chains for extra armor and every nerve burnt out anyway. Rest of her body, dying without intervention. Head, ugly burns, but no deep damage.

"We need to move." Mami. Somewhere nearby.

"Hold on!" Kyouko. She needed to save Kyouko first.

"Sayaka, we need to keep moving! Heal her on the run!" Shaking her shoulders, yelling at her. But she owed it to Kyouko! She had to take care of her first!

Mami gasped. Whirling blades and dying wraiths, the sound of it in every direction. Nagisa's voice rang out in Sayaka's mind, surprised and scared: _'Sayaka! They're here!'_

Kyouko rolled her head backward, caught an upside-down glimpse of what the others were looking at, and added her own analysis: _'The fuck?'_

She reluctantly pulled her eyes up far enough to follow Kyouko's gaze. The nearby wraiths were vanishing into white pixels; spread out atop all the nearby columns, fourteen Clara dolls clad in black and hefting spears with wicked twisted blades stood guarding a perimeter around them.

Three dolls came toward them. Usotsuki, looking worried. Okubyou, looking terrified. They hurried to keep up with the third's fast stride. Hard red eyes burned under the leader's short blond hair, and she held her spear ready like it never left her hand. Mami moved forward to block the newcomers from the wounded, and Nagisa automatically jumped to her side. _'Keep healing,'_ Mami told Sayaka.

"I am Ibari, first among the mourners," the leader announced. "Your attack has failed. Retreat. We will cover your escape."

"To hell with you," Sayaka growled. Kyouko wheezed breathlessly, probably a laugh.

"Sayaka," Mami warned. To the dolls, she kept a ribboned pistol in either hand, almost but not quite raised high enough to point at their leader. "We appreciate assistance in our goals, but I confess I'm somewhat baffled by your motivations. I see tin soldiers battling frequently, but I can count on one hand the number of times I've seen the dolls intercede, much less speak. Why are you taking a sudden interest?"

"It has been ordered." Ibari stared back at Mami, shifting her grip on her spear. "That is all you must know."

"Please, please, little caterpillars shouldn't stay near such a thing." Okubyou, hands over her face, looked like she was ready to collapse to her knees. "Can't you feel it reaching out? Can't you feel it eating at your soul? Little clowns should run away!" On the other flank, Usotsuki said nothing and had her hands clamped over her mouth, but looked at Sayaka fervently.

"I… don't feel anything but the Great Curse's background noise," Mami said.

But it was there, Sayaka could feel it waiting deep in the pit of the Curse, its eye on them, pain and hunger. Kyouko shifted in Sayaka's arms, putting her weight back on her own legs as Sayaka finished healing her. She shook her head at Sayaka's questioning glance; she couldn't feel it either. Nagisa said nothing, but was trembling and her head kept swiveling toward the Curse's center.

"This is bullshit!" Sayaka shouted. "We finally get this far and you think we're backing out because you come along to enforce your mistress's every goddamn whim? We fight and bleed to get in here and you think we'll just drop it and scatter because you say so?"

"Sayaka, cool it!" Kyouko, still in her arms. "Charging in blind like this was a mistake. If we've got a chance to ditch, we should take it."

Sayaka hissed. "I have to get in there." Kyouko stared back at her stubbornly. She could see Mami agreed with Kyouko, even though she still had her pistols ready to shoot Ibari. "Nagisa? We need to find out what's happening in there." The youngest of their group wouldn't even meet her eyes, instead staring down shamefully, though Mami did twitch when Sayaka singled Nagisa out.

Ibari smirked, the closest thing to the dolls' usual smile she showed since arriving. "You'll go on alone, fool." A few wraiths tried to punch through the perimeter, groaning for blood; Ibari didn't bother turning to watch as her sisters fell upon them with lightning-fast spears and destroyed them.

Kyouko caught Sayaka as she tried to pull away. "Hey, Sayaka. Blue!" She pulled up close, pressing their foreheads together. _'I'm not saying we give up! But it's not going to work like this. We take our time, we spend a few weeks raiding the outer plain to cut down the wraith numbers, we map the terrain once they're thin enough for us to come and go as we please, we figure out what the hell we're doing here. There's too many for us to just punch through, so now we need to change it up and play smarter.'_

"You should help us fight in deeper, not help us run away," Sayaka said around Kyouko to the dolls. "If your mistress wasn't outright lying when she said how bad she wants the Great Curse broken, anyway."

"Good-For-Nothing ordered you retreat, and Good-For-Nothing knows best, fool." Ibari sneered. "She will destroy this eyesore when she pleases."

 _'Are the dolls being genuine? We can't stay here, but that doesn't mean I trust them.'_ Mami, privately. _'It seems you've dealt with them before.'_

It burned to reply, but she couldn't say anything else. She wasn't Kyubey, and she wasn't the devil. _'If the dolls say they're here to extract us, then they're here to extract us.'_

"Blue, please." Kyouko, clinging to her neck. "Please don't make me tie you in chains and drag you home, because I swear I will. Please don't try anything that'll get you killed."

"…fine." It was at her fingertips. Just a little farther, and she would finally know _what to do_ , and yet now she was turning tail just because Akemi fucking said so. "I'll leave, damn you."

Kyouko sighed with relief against her. Ibari laughed once like a gunshot.

OoOoO

The wraiths on the outer ring flocked forward where the dark plain met the giants' gravestones of dark mist. They could still feel the enemy within, the blazing light of the girls' hearts echoing across the entire Curse and awakening the hunger of its denizens. They pressed in thick and clambered over one another pushing their way into the winding paths at the ground or sweeping up the mountainous columns, and those that could fly floated above their brethren hoping to taste the presence of the enemy. Some few wraiths larger than the rest, giants too monstrous to fit even into the plaza-like paths along the ground, moaned in frustration as they bashed their robed bodies with ground-shaking crashes against the columns.

Groans of dying agony and clash of battle suddenly rang out over the plain. Here and there, tight packs of tiny bodies darted through the wraiths, giggling as they lashed out with spears. The wraiths tried to ignore them; they didn't taste right, and real prey was so close. But despite the delicate-looking glaze of their skin and the whimsy of their dark clothing out of some black and white daguerreotype, the Clara dolls struck with strength that sent wraiths falling to the ground and moved through the packs with speed and grace that left them untouched, continuously crisscrossing their sisters' paths and ensuring their enemies were threatened from every direction. Their eyes swirled with red for blood and green for pleasure as their dance wheeled among the mayhem.

A streak of black and candy polka-dots tore out from the dark columns and made a break for the far edge. Nagisa flew low, trying to make as tricky a target for distant wraiths as possible and relying on the chaos caused by the Clara dolls to guard her from those nearby. Her passengers again rode along Nagisa's billowing magic, watching the fight below.

"They're strong," Mami noted. "Stronger than most puella magi, and they work together seamlessly."

"Most certainly, for they are no use if they are weak, and my sisters and I have guarded one another's backs since our birth from Good-For-Nothing's dreams," Okubyou said. She was the only Clara doll riding with the puella magi, and perched nonchalantly at the front near Nagisa, kicking her feet. "They can be mended if they break, but do not linger overmuch."

"We could take 'em, there's only fourteen," Kyouko muttered. If she was shaken by her near death only moments before, the only sign she gave was how she pressed her side against Sayaka's and wouldn't budge. But that may have been for Sayaka's benefit, who stared out over the fight without expression and kept her grip tight on her sheathed sword.

"Nagisa, you've picked up a tail," Mami warned. A swarm of the flight-capable wraiths chased along behind them, pale robes billowing, and a few more scattered ahead had noticed them.

 _'I can't go higher or slow down to dodge better,'_ Nagisa warned. _'The ground wraiths will just throw tons of bolts until something hits.'_

Okubyou narrowed her yellow eyes at the wraiths in the sky ahead. "See you keep running as fast as you can, little clown. I can fix a few small blows if the wraiths above chase you down, but more than a few will overwhelm me.

 _'What do you mean,'_ Nagisa swerved around fire from behind, _'Fix?'_

Okubyou just shook her head as Mami returned fire. "Be fast, little caterpillar."

The far edge of the miasma waited, with only one swarm of flying wraiths between them and escape. Everyone pulled closer to Nagisa's magic as the wraiths approached and Nagisa sped up. Then they were among the swarm, grasping hands and eyeless broken faces staring and the flutter of cloth blinding their sight. Nagisa twisted and curved through the monsters, dodging blasts and collisions alike. _'Almost through,'_ Nagisa sent. _'Almost—'_

"NAGISA, DROP!" Mami.

They burst through the thick of the swarm and out the other side, and right into a wraith waiting for them apart from the others. It swiped out, catching Nagisa's black and polka-dotted stream in the side. Mami was closest and had to jump to avoid being crushed. Sayaka stumbled and lost her place; Kyouko tried to snatch her midair, but the cloth of Sayaka's cloak slipped through her fingers. Mami and Sayaka went tumbling down toward the chaotic melee below.

Mami shot a ribbon out to Sayaka immediately, hoping Nagisa could recover in time to grab them both or at least they'd land in the fight together, but the gulf between them already seemed so wide and her ribbon moved as through syrup without getting any closer. No, her ribbon was _coming back_ to her, retracting in reverse. The air was syrupy too, and she couldn't make her limbs move through them right to pivot her fall. Nagisa drifted closer to them, but strangely as if retracing backwards her path since the wraith's hit. They were _all_ moving in reverse. Sayaka's cloak slipped into Kyouko's hands, then Sayaka took her seat again. The wraith's hand pulled away from Nagisa, and Mami landed back where she'd leapt from. Nagisa flew backwards away from the wraith, and back into the swarm.

They burst through the thick of the swarm and out the other side, and this time Nagisa pitched down as hard was she could, right under the wraith's swiping blow.

 _'What the Monterey Jack was that?'_ she screamed in all their heads.

"Just roll with it, kid!" Kyouko shouted. "We were screwed, now we aren't. Keep going!"

"It was my special gift from Good-For-Nothing, to unspin the wheel of time and undo the taken path," Okubyou said. She wasn't perched so carefreely anymore; she clung to Nagisa's flight magic, voice raspy. "Waste it not."

"Just keep going, Nagisa, you're almost there!" Mami said.

And they were; the wraiths behind them couldn't catch up with Nagisa's speed. Distant thunder echoed through the outer wall of miasma now that they were close, but that was infinitely better than the sounds of battle still chasing behind them. They hit the wall at speed, forcing past the clinging tendrils of mist. Then they were through, emerging back into the real world and into a thunderstorm that darkened the sky and drenched them instantly. But pushing through the gales was easier than fighting through a sky of hostile fire, and they all clung tight as Nagisa flew over the broad river.

Nagisa's magic dissipated as they reached the shore; everyone landed lightly on their feet, except for Nagisa who faceplanted into the grassy slope with a wet squelch. "We're alive!" she said, hugging the ground. "I'll never fly again unless there's cheese at the end."

"They won't leave the Curse to chase us during the day, though it might've been different if we tried this at night. We're safe." Like a switch flipped as soon as they were out of danger, Mami's sharp combat mask fell from her face, leaving her trembling. She spun around and made a dash for Kyouko, all but tackling her to the ground with a rib-crushing hug. "I'm sorry, I'm so so sorry!"

"Mami! Ow! Need to breathe!" Kyouko squirmed in her grip. "Well, actually don't need to breathe, but it'd be damn nice, you know?"

"I was so scared of you," Mami said, beginning to sob, "I was so scared you were… were just here to walk away again. And then you, you almost get yourself killed protecting Nagisa, and at best you would have been crippled for months if not for Sayaka, and, and… Kyouko, I'm so sorry!"

"Hey, don't freak out on me, I get why you were like that, I was a real bitch last time we fought, and…" Kyouko looked at Mami, now crying openly on her shoulder. Damn it, it was infectious, she was starting to choke up too. She wrapped her arms around Mami and squeezed. "And I'm sorry for how all that went down. I'm back now."

"Yay, hugs! And then dessert at Mami's!" Nagisa scampered up off the wet grass and threw herself onto Mami and Kyouko, adding one more body to the soppy, dripping wet mess.

And Mami, Kyouko, and Nagisa were so preoccupied that they didn't notice when Okubyou vanished, melting away into the world. Nor did they notice when Sayaka slipped out of sight and jumped into the storm.

OoOoO


	7. Chapter 7

.

 _A/N: Apologies for the longer-than-intended pause. I finished this chapter awhile ago, but the last third needed some revisions, and for various reasons I just kept on writing the next chapter instead of fixing what needed fixing. Upside: A significant chunk of chapter 8 is already done._

 _Also, with this chapter this fic breaks 100k words. Wheeee!_

 _I now return you to your regularly schedule fic._

* * *

 **OoOoO**

 **A Curse Between Us**

 **Chapter 7**

 **OoOoO**

* * *

 _'_ _Sayaka, where are you?'_ Madoka called out mentally as she ran along the city streets. Hardly anyone but her was outside unless they were driving; the stormy winds had calmed somewhat as afternoon changed to evening, but rain still came down endlessly and now it was dark as night. One hand burrowed in a pocket of her thick pink raincoat, gripping her cell phone. She'd tried calling and texting Sayaka for what felt like hours while she ran around the city, until she'd finally gotten a single text in reply: "Downtown, near where the river splits."

And she'd come running. _'_ _Sayaka!'_ Madoka stopped running to lean against a covered bus stop for rest. Her feet hurt; she'd been out here long enough to drown in the rain. _'_ _I know you're out here somewhere! I can feel you! Please, where are you?'_ She'd never tried telepathy with Sayaka before, never paid attention with her feeble senses to the feel of Sayaka's magic—but she knew it anyway, she knew the taste of the salty ocean depths seeping around her now. She grabbed that sensation and thought at it as hard as she could, begging Sayaka to hear her.

 _'_ _Down here.'_ An image flashed into her head, of the bus stop Madoka was resting against, seen from… below? Down a slope. Down the riverbank. Madoka jumped up and took off running toward the river, ignoring the sidewalks, roads, and bridges that would take her over instead. She spotted Sayaka as she got closer, standing near the swollen river's edge in her puella magi clothing and taking no effort to cover herself from the falling rain. Madoka barely managed to skid to a stop on the wet grass, ready to cry and shout and hug and beat her fists against her best friend, but all that stopped when she felt the gaping shadow in the world farther downstream, a patch of darkness deeper than the storm around it.

"W-what is that?" she asked.

"We call it the Great Curse." Sayaka stared over the river, not turning, and her voice was haunted. "The worst miasma in Mitakihara. Enough to swallow all of us if it wakes up . We just tried fighting it. Got our asses kicked."

"I hate it," Madoka blurted out. "It's filthy. It's _wrong._ Why can't everyone feel it? Why isn't everyone in the city panicking? Y-you said normal people can't feel magic or wraiths, but… but this? Why don't they know it's there?"

The fear in Madoka's voice made Sayaka turn; her childhood friend was hugging herself, shaking uncontrollably from more than the cold and wet. Sayaka hurried forward to throw her arms around Madoka, sodden cloak wrapping around them both, and used her body to block the sight of the river and the miasma brooding over it. "I'll protect you from it, it won't hurt you while I'm still up."

Madoka clung back hard. "Come away from the river. Please? Don't just stand there staring at it. You scared me, you scared all of us. There's a bus stop back there we can sit in out of the rain. Please, Sayaka?"

Madoka kept tugging, and eventually Sayaka budged. They went up and settled in the bus stop, watching the raindrops form glowing halos around the streetlights before pooling on the paving stones. They sat side by side, Madoka still clenching Sayaka's hand between them.

"Kyouko called and told me you disappeared," Madoka said. "She was really scared, like you weren't just away cooling off again. She and her friend Mami were afraid you might do something terrible."

"They're probably guarding the banks closest to the Curse?"

"I… I think so? I don't know what they're doing. They said they didn't want you going back in. Is that what they meant?" Sayaka didn't say anything in return; Madoka shifted her grip to cling to Sayaka's entire arm. "Sayaka? Everyone's so worried. What's wrong? Won't you tell me what's wrong?"

Sayaka laughed once, head falling and her wet hair blocking her face. "Do you ever feel like you're on the very brink of doing something stupid, but you can't stop yourself? Even though you know it's stupid? And maybe you don't even want to stop, because you need it that bad?"

"What's stupid? What do you need to do?"

"I'm going back in there. Alone if I have to."

"Sayaka, no!" Madoka let go of her arm and jumped up, moving in front of Sayaka where she couldn't look away. "Didn't you just say all of you together couldn't fight it? Don't go back alone! Wait and try again with everyone!"

"I'll go mad if I wait! She beat me at every turn! She set up the board, controlled everything, never let me even see a path that she didn't want me on! And if everything here is built on a lie and giving up means I can... I almost..." Sayaka took a shuddering breath. "The only thing that's left is the Great Curse, and that's where I'll find out what's going on. I can feel it. I know it!"

"Sayaka…" Madoka shook her head. "Are you talking about Homura?"

"Who else?" Sayaka laughed bitterly, head sinking into on hand. "Who else is there?"

"I… I still don't think I understand everything between you two, but let me talk to her before you do anything alone, please! I'm sure she'll help if I beg her to."

"What do you see in her?" Sayaka asked. She tried to make it sound like a challenge, but it almost came out pleading. "Do you really believe this can end without a fight? Do you really believe she cares about you enough to give in?"

"What do I see in Homura?" The question threw Madoka for a moment, and she wrung her hands. The warm city lights around the bus stop cut through the rain just enough to illuminate the faint blush on her face. "I know she's hard to approach and hard to deal with, um, I guess that's an understatement? But she wouldn't be like that as much if she wasn't so afraid of letting us get closer. She's so uncertain about who she can turn to, she's decided she has to do it all herself, and it's tearing her apart. Does this make sense? I know it seems strange for me to say that since I only met her a little while ago. But, well, I've known her longer than that. You know that, right?"

"And even though she's so hurt and scared and lonely and convinced it has to be this way, she hasn't given up. She doesn't give up. And she's acting out of love, Sayaka. I know it's hard to believe, with how she always wants everyone scared of her and how terribly she acts, but I know it's true. She'll do anything for the people she loves, and she's so selfless. Um, well, maybe not quite that. She has to do it all her way and she won't let go of her important people because they're all she has left, so maybe you can't call it selfless. But she's doing her best. You probably don't believe me, but I'm sure you're one of the people she cares about too." She let her arms fall to the side and gave Sayaka a hopeful smile. "I don't know what will happen, but I'm going to try to end it well."

Sayaka just stared back during Madoka's fumbling speech. "She's lost," she said, unsure but resigned.

Madoka smiled. "Then I'll bring her back. The next time I can, I'm going to make her talk to me. Whether I have to beat her over the head or fall down and cry in front of her, I'm not letting her go."

 _'_ _Do look around, Miki.'_

Sayaka sat up and twisted around, searching. Out in the rain, holding a wide umbrella, Akemi stood by the river with Okubyou at one side and Nagisa shirking at the other. Madoka followed Sayaka's gaze and squeaked in surprise. "Homura! Um, don't panic, um, Sayaka you stay here, and I'll, um, I'll go talk to her…"

"She's not here for you." Sayaka stood.

Madoka shook her head, balling her fists but looking scared and ashamed for feeling that way. "But, I need to talk to Homura. There are, um, we fought last time, and I need to set things right."

"Then she'll run if you come out." Sayaka walked out into the rain.

Behind her, Madoka fidgeted in the bus stop. "Be careful," she called out. "Don't let her push you!"

Sayaka stopped a few paces away from the group. Nagisa flinched into Akemi's side when Sayaka looked at her. "I'm sorry," Nagisa said.

"Try not to be too angry with Nagisa for being my little assistant," Akemi said as she stepped forward to bring the umbrella over Sayaka. "You gave your friends quite a fright, Miki. I found Nagisa running about in the rain looking for you, even though she knew I wanted to hear all about your attempt on the Great Curse. But she and I have had our chat now, and she's told me all sorts of interesting things."

"Happy to see me fail?" Sayaka asked.

"Of course not." Akemi passed the large umbrella to Okubyou, who held it over the group. "Come, Miki. When I told Nagisa to arrange an attack on the Great Curse, I also told her I would step in if it proved too strong for normal puella magi." She smirked at the scowl on Sayaka's face. "You still think I'm lying. Is it so hard to believe I want that blight gone from my perfect world? If you won't believe what I say, then come and see for yourself."

"Mami and Kyouko are guarding the shore closest to the Curse," Sayaka warned.

With a faint shrug, Akemi transformed in a flash of purple light. She cranked her shield, putting one hand above Sayaka's wrist to bring her along. The world went gray and the rain hung in the air, all color leeching away except from the two of them. They left Madoka, Nagisa, and Okubyou behind and walked downstream closer to the Curse. They passed Kyouko, looking frustrated and hugging herself against the cold as she took shelter underneath a bridge.

"She'll wait," Homura said when Sayaka looked at Kyouko with obvious worry. "Let her sit here and enjoy the show. You can regale her later with tales of how you and I fought the Curse together." Sayaka huffed, but didn't leave Homura's side. Homura nodded toward the river, and the two of them jumped away from the shore.

The leap seemed to take longer than it did before, but that was only because this time Sayaka didn't feel the adrenaline and eagerness pounding through her blood. The rain cut off as they plunged through the wall of the miasma and landed on the edge of the wide misty plain that formed the outer ring of the Great Curse. The first raid must have put some dent in the wraiths' numbers, because they had a clear landing space without having to blast one open. Farther in, the wraiths had once again formed rings circling the mountainous terrain.

Homura's shield snapped its gears to a halt, and what color there was inside the miasma came back. The wraiths continued their shuffling, groaning procession. "You sure you don't want that running?" Sayaka asked.

"I stopped time so we could pass your friends without incident. It won't be necessary inside the miasma." Homura eyed the wraiths ahead, who still hadn't noticed them. "Would you like to hear a story about a time before this one?"

"As if I could trust anything you say about it, devil. You're the one who took my memories of that world in the first place."

"You're right. I'm certain to lie," Homura said with a twist of her lips. "So instead of the truth, let me tell you a fairy tale, and you'll be free to disbelieve it in your infinite wisdom."

"The world was broken, Miki. It was broken and could not be saved. The goddess of that realm was strong and righteous and loving, but even she could not fix the sundered earth. Demons roamed free and devoured whom they would, and the knights who fought them in the name of the goddess lived a thankless life of futility. They could not slay these demons, only hold back the tide a little longer."

Akemi's magic flared, and the wraiths finally noticed them. The things broke their procession and came gliding toward them, but they didn't have a chance. The dark bow set with amethysts appeared in Akemi's hand, and purple light like fire pulled from the heavens formed as she drew. She loosed arrow after arrow across the plain. The wraiths were so much more durable than usual when Sayaka was fighting them, but now they crumpled when Akemi's arrows tore into them. Every blast ripped through the wraith it struck and kept going through to others, cutting deep lines into the charging horde of monsters.

She went on, not even straining as she channeled so much magic. "In this hopeless world there lived a knight devoted to defending her helpless lady. Many dangers threatened the lady. The demons that devoured all they caught. Death on the battlefield, should the lady's great compassion lead her to take up arms. And a dark witch, a cruel and selfish woman. The witch was the greatest threat of all, for she loved the lady with her entire darkened heart and was always waiting to spirit her away should the knight's guard fail for even a moment."

The tide of wraiths came still, and Akemi stepped forward and raised her bow to the sky. Once again, she summoned a shard of magic so pure the world around them seemed weak and dim by comparison. Once again, the arrow soared into the sky and unraveled into lines of light that curved and twisted their way across the miasma's far-off ceiling. Once again, the patterns shattered, and thousands of arrows of purple light rained down.

"But even though the knight never left her lady's side so the witch would not steal her away, she still could not fight all the demons in the world. They came to the lady's castle, an army so thick they darkened the sun. So it was the demons broke the gate and overran the knight and took the lady to be devoured."

And once again, the arrows broke among the wraiths like divine fury.

OoOoO

Madoka stood in the rain on the riverbank once again, watching the Great Curse. Its thick mists lit up as if with purple lightning, and she could feel its distant rumble even here. Something was happening, and she had no idea what. It had to be Homura and Sayaka. Were they fighting? Were they fighting the miasma and the wraiths? Or each other?

She reached out, looking for the taste of flame and cold blades. _'_ _Kyouko?'_

 _'_ _Pinkie? What's going on, you find Sayaka?'_

 _'_ _Yes, but Homura came and they left together, and… and I think they went back inside that awful miasma together, the thunder and lightning has to be Homura!'_

 _'_ _Shit.'_

 _'_ _Kyouko, please, do something!'_

OoOoO

They landed on the first mountainous column of mist, leaving the plain behind. Akemi paused to look around, taking in the new terrain while Sayaka waited impatiently. She smiled and quirked her head forward, and they went bounding over the columns and the long gaps between them.

"And then, seeing the knight fallen and the lady taken, the witch grew wroth, and swore it would not be. She worked her magic and stormed the gates of heaven itself, for her art was mighty indeed. She'd had the power to defeat the knight and take the lady's castle any time she pleased, but always stayed her hand because she knew the lady would be heartbroken to see such a thing."

The wraiths swarmed out from their hiding places, and Akemi's arrows met them as they appeared. Sayaka was sure they'd already gone deeper into the Curse than she had with Kyouko, Mami, and Nagisa. The top of three nearby towers burst and wraiths came swarming out, already at close range. Akemi spared them a glance, and with a flip of her hand a wave of black-violet energy crackling with multicolored corruption surged outwards from her. Black feathers drifted in its wake, and it didn't feel like swirling wine and rusty grinding gears as Akemi's magic usually did. Sayaka couldn't place it, could barely even think through it. The sensation of it crushed over her senses like laughter and love and madness, all of it heavier than a mountain and wider than her senses could grasp.

It touched the wraiths that tried to ambush them, and they disintegrated. The wave of magic kept going, passing through terrain in every direction, turning every wraith it touched into a burst of pixelated light and leaving small black feathers drifting on the air behind it.

"But now with the lady's life in danger, the witch did not withhold her fury. She threw down the goddess of that world and took her power. With the goddess's power added to her own she rescued the lady, crushed the demons, and mended the world."

No more wraiths appeared as they made their way through the last of the columns. They came to what had to be the center of the Great Curse; Sayaka could feel the rest of the miasma pushing in on this single point. In the very center, the mountains gave way to a crater filled with shifting mist tinged with faint violet light.

"You could never protect her, Miki," Akemi said as they stood on the last column. "Call yourself her knight if you like, but you were too weak and frail. You fell too easily too many times and left her alone. But I, I have taken the power I need to protect her." She smirked. "Now, shall we find go down and see what the problem is?"

Akemi stepped off the edge, and Sayaka followed. They landed and walked down the slope of the crater; the light violet mists pulled away from their path as they moved forward but still clung around and above them. Ahead, the light pulsed to their footsteps. It was watching them, as it had while Sayaka fought wraiths with abandon. It tasted her, looking for the fury that had overwhelmed her before. Sayaka stumbled. "Akemi, wait—"

With a thrust of her hand, Akemi sent out a rush of wind that threw back the mists.

A shimmering portal hung in the air before them, a latticework of magic power that curled and twisted upon itself into intricate patterns that hurt to look at. Its main body was light violet, but a speckled mesh of other colors twisted through it, slashing blues and spattered crimsons and sickly yellows fighting atop each other and mottling the thing.

"What?" Akemi muttered. She stared at the thing, frozen in place. "This—this is..."

Kyouko told her about these; more, something forgotten was frantically trying to claw its way out from the holes in Sayaka's memory, a horror, a panic—

The entry to the shadow's labyrinth pulsed, and Akemi let out a strangled gurgle before falling as if struck down.

"Akemi?" Sayaka hesitated, but the portal wasn't doing anything else, wasn't… surging to try to swallow them in like Kyouko said shadows sometimes do. It was just sitting there pulsing. She dropped to her knees at Akemi's side. The other girl stared up without focusing, clearly not seeing anything in front of her as she began shaking. "Akemi, pull your shit together already!"

Akemi shuddered, reaching a hand not quite straight into the air and clasping at nothing. "'m sorry," she muttered through chattering teeth. "'m sorry, 'm sorry." Sayaka grabbed the hand and pushed her healing magic into Akemi—or tried to, and hit a wall of Akemi's mad feather magic and bounced off right away. She fell backwards onto the ground, stunned for a few seconds by the mental recoil.

The giggling snapped her back to alertness.

They came prancing in from every direction, fourteen of them whispering and snickering behind their hands, twirling their spears or jabbing them into the ground. Sayaka stumbled to her feet, drawing a sword as the Clara dolls circled her and Akemi. The ones she recognized best stood out. Usotsuki, leaning close to speak to Manuke, who clenched her hands in front of her mouth as if praying. Okubyou, tittering away but half-hiding behind Ibari, who stared at the two puella magi with disgust. Reiketsu, rocking back and forth on her heels with her hands behind her back, shaking her head in mock regret and doing nothing to hide the grin that split her face.

They were Akemi's servants, weren't they? But Sayaka found herself crouching over the other girl anyway and calling out a challenge. "What do you want?" A fresh wave of giggling. "Answer me! Are you here to help her or not?"

Ibari stepped forward and flung something. Sayaka instinctively batted it away with her sword, sending it to the ground with a _splut_. Red seeped from the broken mess—a tomato? Reiketsu sprung forward next, yanking two more tomatoes out from behind her back. All the Clara dolls followed suit, and began throwing a hail of tomatoes Sayaka couldn't possibly block. Homura shrieked and twisted away as the first one hit her shoulder. "'m sorry, 'm sorry, didn't want to, I promise!"

"What are you doing, you lunatics?" Sayaka shouted. "Isn't she your master?"

"Gott ist tot," one of them chanted. "Gott ist tot durch deine Hand!"

"Deine Hand!"

"Gott ist tot durch deine Hand!" The words echoed in as the others took up the chant, mingling it with their laughter. "Deine Hand! Deine Hand! Gott ist tot!"

"She made me, I didn't want to!" Akemi wailed, curling in on herself insensibly. It did no good; tomatoes still struck her back, her side, her head, staining her bloody crimson. "I promised her, I'm sorry!"

Before Sayaka could make sense of what was happening or decide how to react, a little white creature slipped between the legs of the Clara dolls and padded forward. It settled on its haunches beneath the rain of tomatoes, red eyes fixing on Sayaka and its set grin making it look the very picture of happiness.

 _'_ _Now then, Miki Sayaka, I think it's well past time we had a proper discussion. But to begin with, would you kindly kill Akemi Homura?'_

OoOoO

A helpless whine escaped Nagisa as she wrung her hands, standing at the river with the umbrella Okubyou left her before running off to... she didn't know. The resounding thunder and purple light crackling through the miasma of the Great Curse had been terrifying. It could only be Miss Akemi, she knew it. Now that Madoka was captured, Miss Akemi was the only one left with that much power. And then the thunder and magic light stopped, which was worse in every single way because _the Great Curse was still there._

What happened? Did Miss Akemi decide not to destroy it? But why? She said she wanted the Curse gone, and Nagisa couldn't see any reason why she would lie about that. It was dangerous to the whole city where Madoka lived, of course Miss Akemi would smash it.

What if she stopped fighting because something happened to her? Sayaka was in there too, and if whatever it was beat Miss Akemi, then Sayaka wouldn't stand a chance. Or if it stopped because Sayaka tried attacking Miss Akemi while she was already distracted with the Curse… would Sayaka do something that crazy? Nagisa shivered as she remembered drowning in the overwhelming fury of the shadow of Oktavia. Of course. Like this, of course she would.

Okubyou still wasn't back from wherever, but she couldn't help imagining what her watcher would say. _"You haven't grasped a thing what's happening there,"_ Okubyou would probably mutter in her ear while trying to be as creepy as possible. _"Little clowns—"_

"Little clowns should stay put," Nagisa finished, spitting the words out at the empty air. "I know! I know I know I know I know I know! I heard you the first bajillion times!"

Nagisa shivered. But she couldn't stay put. Something was wrong in there, and Sayaka and Miss Akemi might need help, and no one was ever going to tell her anything. Not Sayaka who didn't know anything, not Miss Akemi who wanted her stuck, not Madoka or Kyouko who barely knew her yet, not Mami who wanted her safe, no one was ever going to tell her when it was finally time to do something, _anything_ useful. Nagisa swallowed and balled her hands into fists—

And caught a glimpse of flashing crimson, as Kyouko leapt spear-first through the air from the patch of riverbank she guarded, heading toward the miasma. Nagisa sagged, knees weak. Kyouko. Kyouko, who was faster and stronger and smarter than her. Kyouko, who got hurt because she had to protect Nagisa. Kyouko would do a better job than her.

OoOoO

Sayaka stared at the Incubator swishing its tail like a clock. "What?"

 _'That is your objective, is it not? To throw down the devil by any means necessary? I can almost promise you that you'll never have as good an opportunity as this.'_

"What have you done to her, Incubator?"

Kyubey quirked its head in confusion. _'Why is that so many puella magi follow that same train of thought when complications arise? I've not done anything to her, as you put it. Akemi Homura is quite capable of ruining herself without my assistance. Now, I'll ask again, is it not your goal to throw down the devil?'_

The Clara dolls did not let up, giggling and chanting "Gott ist tot durch deine Hand!" as they kept throwing; Akemi whimpered and shuddered with every hit.

"It is," Sayaka agreed.

 _'Then this is a golden opportunity for you. You might mistrust me, but you should realize by now that I don't make false statements. I can confirm many of the truths you surely suspect by now, Miki Sayaka.'_ Kyubey padded forward, intent on her. _'Kaname Madoka is indeed the embodiment of the Law of Cycles, which you puella magi so revere and rely upon for salvation. You were indeed her ally and servant, as the Clara dolls name you her angel. And Akemi Homura was indeed filled with jealousy and lust and tore Kaname Madoka from her place within the Law of Cycles, damaging and reshaping the world itself for her own gratification. When Akemi Homura then altered your memory, you swore you would continue to oppose her.'_

The flash of memory came to Sayaka: _"The one thing I'll never forget is that you, Akemi Homura, are a devil!"_ She stumbled back. "Why are you telling me this, Incubator? Why risk betraying your master here?"

 _'Risk? What risk?'_ The Incubator seemed truly puzzled. _'My jailor lies helpless before her greatest enemy. Or perhaps you refer to the Clara dolls? Put them out of mind. As her familiars, they act on Akemi Homura's emotions and commands.'_

"'m sorry, 'm sorry." The words came up in a keening, whimpering voice.

The Incubator padded forward, careful not to catch any tomatoes, and pushed at Akemi's cheek with one paw to roll her head back. Panicked violet eyes stared at the sky. _'Even Akemi Homura hates herself for what she's done. No, her familiars aren't going to stop either of us on their own. Now, Miki Sayaka, there is nothing barring your path. Kill Akemi Homura and restore the Law of Cycles!'_

Sayaka looked at Akemi lying pathetically at her feet. Even this vulnerable and this out of it, could Sayaka actually do anything to her? Akemi's power was terrifying, and the mask of being puella magi was only a lie hiding her true devilish nature. Even if she could, would destroying Akemi's soul gem do anything?

No, that was a useless way to think. Wondering whether she could accomplish anything was a waste of time. She had to assume it would work and just go with it. So, a better question:

Was she going to kill Akemi Homura?

It would end the devil's reign. It would free Madoka and the Law of Cycles from Akemi's prison. It would mean Sayaka wouldn't be chained here anymore, missing half her brain and fighting through a haze of anger and confusion every second of every day.

Akemi was all but wrapped around herself, but Sayaka kicked one arm free and pushed her boot onto the wrist of the girl writhing at her feet. The purple kite-shaped gem glinted on the back of her hand, and Sayaka lowered her sword so the point hovered scant inches over it.

"Töte Gott durch deine eigene Hand," the dolls sang.

 _"What do you see in her?"_ Sayaka had asked Madoka.

And Madoka's eyes had softened, and the fear and worry drained from her face, replaced with a fond smile. _"She's acting out of love,"_ Madoka had answered.

"…not like this."

 _'Pardon me?'_

"Whatever she's done, she's one of ours." Sayaka reluctantly pulled her sword back and rammed it hard into its sheath. "I'm not killing her here."

 _'But this is a unique opportunity! Now that Akemi Homura knows what effect the shadow within the Great Curse has on her, she'll certainly never risk exposure again.'_

"I'm not letting it go down like this." Sayaka grabbed Akemi and hoisted her over her shoulder. A tomato missed her passenger and struck the side of Sayaka's face; juices seeped down her neck.

 _'She's already destroyed your mind once. Can you really believe she won't do the same again as soon as she recovers? She can't leave you with knowledge of her weakness like this. She'll destroy you utterly.'_

Another tomato hit Sayaka as she started forward, on the hip a few inches to the left of her soul gem. "Hey! Cheap antique store rejects! I'm taking your master out of here, if you've got a problem then step forward so I can knock you on your ass! Otherwise, cut it with the damn tomatoes!" She kept walking toward the line of Clara dolls; they wavered, until Usotsuki and Okubyou gave way to make an opening as Sayaka came barging through.

 _'I know Akemi Homura's goal!'_ Kyubey cried, running after Sayaka's heels with panic in its voice. _'If Madoka Kaname accepts her place in this world, her true nature as the Law of Cycles will cease trying to force its way out of her prison. She will lose the ability to break free and Akemi Homura will win. Do you truly believe this can end without bloodshed? As events are currently progressing, do you truly believe Kaname Madoka will reject the devil?'_

Sayaka stopped, remembering again the way Madoka's eyes softened when she spoke of Akemi. She snarled, "I fucking said, _not like this!_ " and took off at a run, jumping back onto the lowest of the mist columns and working her way up.

She was an idiot, she really was an idiot. Here she was, the secret of the Great Curse within reach, and she was turning around again. Not because Akemi said so this time, oh no, it got better than that. Because she needed to rescue Akemi's ass.

"I'm going to break your goddamn nose again after we get out of here," she shouted at the stick-thin girl whimpering on her shoulder. "You owe me that much!"

 _'Sayaka!'_ Kyouko bounded over the columns from the other direction, closing in fast. _'The hell are you doing and the hell is going—is that Homura? Is that blood? The hell happened?'_

Sayaka slid to a stop as Kyouko landed nearby. "Take her!"

"What? What's going on, where are all the goddamn wraiths?"

Sayaka unslung Akemi and shoved her into Kyouko's arms. "The shadow at the center of the Great Curse is killing her, she needs to get out of here! Take her!"

Kyouko looked down at Akemi and up at Sayaka, back and forth without making much sense of it. "Shadow? There's a shadow in there? Who's powerful enough to make a shadow like—" She stopped, looked down at Homura, eyes going wide. "And it's killing her?"

"She needs to get out of here," Sayaka shouted one last time, before turning around once again and jumping away.

"Wait!" Kyouko shouted after her. "Get back here! Please, Sayaka!" But she didn't follow; her shouting grew distant, then cut off with a violent curse.

Sayaka grinned to herself as she landed once again in the crater. The Clara dolls were gone, their master no longer here and incapable of giving orders to stop her anyway. Kyubey was gone too, screwed off to who cared where. Finally, it was just her and the portal coruscating with mottled colors.

She leapt in.

She fell through the portal, and plunged through the surface of the world like she was travelling beneath its mask. It felt like she was falling someplace else as she entered the labyrinth of the shadow, but the crater and the misty terrain around her stayed exactly where they were.

Far above, the ceiling of miasma gave way to a shifting star field. Galaxies and lone stars spun far faster than a sky possibly could on any real planet; the powers of creation swirled, and Sayaka watched as the universe realigned itself over and over again. Closer to her, the mist that formed the columns and mounds of terrain around the crater pulled itself together and hardened until high rise skyscrapers and broad buildings emerged. The winding paths through the buildings became streets that twisted madly in ways no civil engineer would ever design.

With a scream of shattering glass, flames burst out from one tower, then another as a mass of bodies took to the streets. Tin soldiers fought with cotton-faced mermaids while ring-faced mice sprinted between them, all order and organization trampled beneath the press of mobs as spears flashed and dying screams echoed.

The battle swept toward her, but there was no point getting tangled in a melee right now and nothing here could threaten her at range like wraiths could. Sayaka formed a platform of shimmering blue music staffs and launched herself up. She needed information, she needed to figure out what was in this labyrinth and where the master shadow was.

She landed on the rooftop of one of the intact towers and looked over the city. Exploding dirigibles dotted the sky, clouds of crows flocked into the burning buildings and died heedlessly, and from this vantage point Sayaka could see shuddering lines of dark energy twisting through the entire city. They wound around and through buildings clinging to everything, all gathering together at a tower that stood atop a half-circle bridge that rose above the ground.

She didn't see any of the weird giant monsters Kyouko described as shadows, but the tower with the dark strands running toward it seemed the most important. She launched toward it.

As she got closer, she saw the tower's face was almost completely built of arches lined up and stacked together, making the entire thing open in every direction. Crimson-black viscous liquid seeped over many of the openings, and Sayaka caught the outlines of familiar girls in the shifting curtain waterfall, dancing or reaching out or struggling with each other before they disappeared as the liquid shifted. Sayaka made sure not to get any of the stuff on her as she passed through to the inside; she could feel the tainted energy washing off it just as clear as she could feel it from wraiths or excess grief.

 _Pain._ Sayaka fell to her knees, barely a few steps inside the tower. _Agony, rage._ The presence she'd felt earlier knew she was here, and its eye was on her, a thousand times worse here in the labyrinth of the shadow.

Images flashed through her mind. Her sword, dangling inches away from Homura's gem. _Strike._ Bits of a dozen Incubators going everywhere as she hacked and stabbed and screamed. _Kill._ A pair of arms wrapping around her, Kyouko's voice begging her to just talk to her already. _Alone._

"Get out of my head." Sayaka fell forward, barely getting her arms out to stop herself from hitting the ground face-first. She tried pushing back against the overwhelming presence, but it was like pushing the earth. A sword rammed inside a shield. A knight and a princess dancing to a symphony. "Get out of my head, damn you!"

Again, her sword dangling over Homura's soul gem. Broken girls lying in a crater, water pooling around them. Sheets of rain tinted purple by the twisted evening light. Red-rimmed glasses around tear-blotchy eyes.

Sayaka felt like she was being torn and strangled. She looked up and, through blurry vision, saw that the girls had stepped out of the waterfall of grief and stood around her silently. Familiar, all of them so very familiar, even though they were only outlines of crimson-black. Something was hovering above them in the open space of the tower; she could feel it, but not crane her head far up enough to see. The girl with pigtails and a wide skirt drew a bow and aimed it at her.

Ah. So this was a curse. This pain, cast off and buried alive to fester. Her body was heavy, unable to push back the weight of the shadow's anger. What could she do against this?

Something ripped through the side of the tower in a shower of stone. It rushed toward her, enormous and sinuous and so fast it blurred, but she caught sight of red splotches on a black body and a clown-white face. The snake-thing struck at the curse-girls, knocking most away and tossing one up to catch in bladelike teeth. It swallowed and came down to devour another with obvious relish, twisting its winding body to crush the others against the ground.

It wound closely past Sayaka, and she found herself instinctively grabbing onto a pair of red and blue wings sprouting out the top of its head. Then they were in flight tearing away from the tower at full speed. Sayaka could tell the thing was being careful not to drop her even though her grip was weak. She was safe for now, wasn't she? She got one last view of a universe of stars swirling above them as they shot up into the sky before she finally slipped into the darkness.

OoOoO

She'd done it now. Miss Akemi was going to _kill_ her. Not even Mami probably knew a word for how dead she was.

She'd do it again.

Sayaka dangled from her back as she made her way up the wet grassy river bank. She almost wished puella magi weren't super strong, because then she could say Sayaka was too heavy for her and take her sweet time reaching everyone else.

She found them under the closest bridge to the Great Curse. Kyouko and Mami were arguing, Mami tense and quietly, Kyouko shouting and waving her arms. Miss Akemi lay apart from the others, no longer wearing her puella magi uniform. Okubyou flitted about her where the others couldn't see, whispering in her mistress's ear. Nagisa flinched when Okubyou jabbed a finger in her direction and Miss Akemi looked at her.

"Sayaka!" Kyouko came running over as soon as she spotted them. "Is she okay? Is Sayaka okay?"

"She's asleep? But I don't think she's hurt." Nagisa let Kyouko drag Sayaka off her back and lay her out on the ground.

Mami was only barely behind Kyouko. "Did you go in there by yourself? Oh Nagisa, why didn't you call us?"

"I'm okay too, thank you, Mami."

Mami looked like she couldn't decide whether to break down crying or hug her or start shouting. "But why didn't you call?"

"There wasn't time to get everyone! I saw Homura and Sayaka go in and I'm the only one who flies!"

Mami shook her head, but leaned down and hugged her anyway. "I still would have wanted to know you were going in. We had no idea what was happening anywhere until Kyouko's friend told us these two went in together."

"You mean Madoka? Where is she?"

"I don't know, we can have Kyouko check on her soon. You are okay, aren't you Nagisa?"

"She's coming around," Kyouko called out, hands on Sayaka's head.

Sayaka groaned, blinking stupidly. "Where?"

"Outside the Curse again," Kyouko said. "Stay down and rest."

"Where's the snake? Where's Akemi?" Sayaka tried to get up; Kyouko easily pushed her back down and held her there.

"I said stay down, you fucking idiot! What were you thinking going back in there? No, don't answer, just shut up and stay down, I'll bite your head off later. Mami, help me with her will you?"

Miss Akemi struggled to her feet—she was paler than usual and walked shakily. She ignored Mami and Kyouko, both still focused on Sayaka, and staggered over to Nagisa, who shrank back. Okubyou glared, still flitting about out of sight.

"I had to," Nagisa pleaded quietly. "She needed help."

She squeaked in fright when Miss Akemi's hand came up… and came down on her head, rubbing between the cat ears of her hood.

"You did well," Miss Akemi said, voice hoarse. It seemed even moving forward enough to put a hand on Nagisa's head was too much for her balance right now, because Miss Akemi's slight weight leaned onto Nagisa for the few seconds her hand stayed there. Then she pushed off and began walking unsteadily away from the group.

"Hey, you're in no shape to run off either, you get your ass back here and lie down," Kyouko called after her.

"That won't be necessary." Akemi didn't even turn her head back. "I'll survive. You look after your own."

"Homura, wait! Someone should go with you! Nagisa, go make sure she doesn't keel over in an alley, will you?"

"Stay here, Bebe," Homura ordered, rooting Nagisa to the spot in the middle of stepping forward.

Kyouko looked badly torn for a few seconds while Homura vanished around a corner and Nagisa stayed in place, but didn't get up from Sayaka's side. "Goddamn idiots, all of you," she muttered.

Sayaka tried getting up again, still clearly out of it, and got shoved down again. "Where's Madoka? Where did Madoka go?"

"Not into the Curse, unlike some idiots," Kyouko muttered. "Mami, ribbon her down already will you?"

Nagisa rubbed the spot of her hood where Miss Akemi had touched her. It was a good question. She reached out. _'Um, um, Miss Madoka? Are you out there?'_

 _'Who—ah, the girl who was with Homura? Nagisa? Is that you?'_

 _'You remembered me!'_

 _'What's going on? What happened to Sayaka and Homura, are they okay?'_

 _'We dragged Miss Akemi and Sayaka out of the Curse. They're both a little wonky, but no one's hurt.'_

Waves of relief swept down from Madoka. _'I see. Good. Thank you for telling me, Nagisa.'_

 _'What about you? Where are you? Are you okay? Sayaka's worried about you too!'_

 _'Me?'_ Madoka sounded surprised the others were worried about her. _'I'm okay, nothing's happened here. Where is everyone?'_

 _'I think Miss Akemi went home? Maybe? She left, anyway. The rest of us are still by the river.'_

 _'Homura went home? I see. Thank you very much, Nagisa. You can tell everyone I'm safe. And if she asks, please tell Sayaka I'm going to do what I told her I would earlier.'_

 _'Um…'_

 _'Don't worry, she'll understand. Thank you again!'_

Madoka withdrew the connection, leaving Nagisa wondering what that meant. "Where is she?" Sayaka begged feverishly, while Kyouko and Mami tried to stop her struggling. "Where's Madoka?"

OoOoO

The door of Homura's apartment opened; she practically fell through, but caught a hand on the wall to steady herself.

 _'I see you escaped your predicament,'_ Kyubey sent.

A surge of power yanked the Kyubey across the room and into her open hand; its face bulged as she squeezed. "Did you think you could hide from me, betrayer? I know what you did! I know, and I'll deal with you later. Stay out of my home and don't show yourself in front of me again unless I call you."

She opened her hand. Kyubey twisted midair, didn't quite land it, and scrambled to right itself and sprint out the open door as fast as it could. Homura sagged as soon as it was gone, and made her way deeper into her apartment. Really, telling Sayaka so much she was better off not knowing and inciting her to kill Homura, all right in front of her dolls and in spite of the magic bindings she placed on it… the Incubator was restless. If she was steadier right now she would've kept her chained enemy around a little longer. She could ask it how it felt knowing that even though it hadn't done anything hurtful to Sayaka in this world, she _still_ chose a wretched devil over the Incubator. Karma runs deep.

Homura took a deep breath, recalling the feel of the shadow clutching her soul. Karma ran deep indeed.

She pushed into the clock room and stood for a moment watching her scythed pendulum swing back and forth, catching the light of candelabras on its downswing. This room used to be so much brighter. Why bother, though? The lighting, the dark Victorian couches and chairs, and the rest of the new décor suited her well enough. Having enough couches and chairs to arrange them like the face of a clock was beginning to seem needless, though; she couldn't remember the last time she had more than one guest.

Homura sank into a seat on in innermost ring around the center table and turned her attention to the floating holodisplays. She wasn't sure which she wanted to look away from more, the ones showing the Great Curse in various angles and overlays, or the pictures of Madoka. The displays had shifted around in her absence; Madoka had found her way next to the poetry excerpt. The witch runes in the holodisplay trembled as if longing to skitter away, but she understood them clearly.

 _"_ _I sung of Chaos and Eternal Night,  
Taught by the heav'nly Muse to venture down  
The dark descent, and up to reascend,  
Though hard and rare: thee I revisit safe,  
And feel thy sovran vital Lamp;"_

Her lips twisted. It seemed like such a perfect little verse when she picked it from Milton. She had certainly passed through chaos and eternal night and down the dark descent. Once as a puella magi seeking escape from the eternal maze that led to Madoka's death at every end, once as a witch who betrayed Madoka's sacrifice, and once as the devil who tore the goddess from the sky, guided through all of them by the sovereign light of the one person who mattered more than anything.

But what good was any of it—what good was _she_ —if she swallowed and extinguished that light as soon as she laid hands on it?

Homura reached down to the table and lifted a goblet, full of memory and agony, and pressed it to her lips.

 _The ruins of Mitakihara lie twisted around them. Walpurgisnacht already moved on and would destroy again, but that has nothing to do with them; Homura and Madoka are fallen. The water pooling around them, from the rain and from the city ruins, is stained purple by the light of the sun setting through the dust clouds left from the battle._

 _"I wish you hadn't saved me back then," Homura whispers. "With your last grief seed. I said we could become monsters together and wipe away everything terrible in this world."_

 _Madoka, breath rattling, drags herself onto her side and taps her last grief seed to Homura's soul gem to pull out the corruption. Her own gem is almost entirely dark, but the despair that must be filling her doesn't stop her from smiling. "I couldn't let you do that, silly. I don't want to give up, and I won't let you become a monster." From the music note design running across the seed, Homura will later realize that Madoka used Oktavia von Seckendorff, the witch of Madoka's best friend, to save her soul. That was how much Madoka would give up for her._

 _"But I have become a monster! I've done terrible things to you, over and over, and I'll keep doing it!"_

 _"Because you think it's worth it. Don't you?" Madoka reaches over to stroke her face. "You know what happens next, right Homura? You promised me."_

 _"No, please, please don't make me do it again." Homura is crying freely._

 _"I'm sorry. I know it's hard. It's the only way."_

 _With shaky hands, Homura pulls a pistol from her shield and levels it. "Please," she begs. But Madoka only smiles serenely, waiting to be saved. Homura shrieks like the damned, drowning out the gunshot when she pulls the trigger._

 _Because, no matter how much it hurts, she can sacrifice anything._

The drink burned as it went down, dragging up the worst parts of her soul. She deserved this. The paradise she worked so long and hard to create, and the perverse mockery that paradise truly was—she deserved all of it.

Homura sank bonelessly until she was lying flat on the couch, staring up at the clockwork pendulum swinging above her. The longer she stared at it, she could almost swear the scythe was coming a hair's breadth lower with every swing.

What passed for peace in Homura's apartment broke as someone started banging on the front door with full fists. "Homura! I know you're home, Homura!"

OoOoO

"Homura!" Madoka kept knocking hard with one hand while she kept the other hand on the intercom. "You have to talk to me sometime!" She kept going for almost a minute without any answer, so she stopped pounding the door and shouted into the intercom. "I know what your wish was! The girl you wanted to protect, the girl you had to kill—that was me! You wished because you wanted to save me!"

The following silence was eventually broken by the sound of a bolt and chain being unlocked.

The door opened, and Madoka had to fight off the urge to hug Homura. She looked pale and conflicted, and swayed just noticeably on her feet. "May I come in?" Madoka asked meekly.

"Do what you like."

Homura didn't lead Madoka inside so much as Madoka chased after her back. The haggard-looking girl went to a dark room at the back of the apartment and fell onto a couch in the inner ring; Madoka stayed close at her heels and, after a moment's hesitation, took a seat at the very end of the same couch Homura claimed. The room, with its scythed pendulum and candle lighting, certainly felt like somewhere Homura would lurk. Madoka studied the floating displays, catching maps of Mitakihara and the Great Curse and old foreign texts she couldn't read.

Pictures of Sayaka, Kyouko, Mami, and herself drifted through the displays too. A few of them showed the girls in their puella magi outfits in the middle of action—including herself with a bow and a poofy pink dress that seemed just right for her—but so many of them were photos from little moments of daily life. DDR and arcade games, eating cake at an apartment that looked like it belonged to Mami, Sayaka and Kyouko wrestling on the grass, Madoka with a beaming smile looking at the camera while she bounced around in a big comfy chair at home. All of them had been taken by someone up close, right in the middle of the group, someone welcome among them.

How long ago had Homura taken these pictures? How long since she'd been this close to her friends?

"You were always more clever than others thought you," Homura said out of nowhere. She smiled, wan but proud of the girl sitting before her."Just because you aren't as decisive as Sayaka and Kyouko or as composed as Mami, they think your hesitation comes from foolishness. But we know differently, don't we, dear Madoka? You hang back and find out everything you can. You piece together secrets until you understand, and then you strike."

"Homura…" She didn't like how Homura was praising her—she sounded too much like she was congratulating a deserving enemy.

"It was inevitable you would discover something you weren't supposed to. My talkative little dolls, the Incubator weaseling through loopholes, Sayaka piecing together what she could, my own undisciplined blather, memories of the past seeping in from another life—there were a dozen ways you could piece this together. And what now, dearest? Is this the moment you swear your revenge and we tear the world down around us?"

"What? No! Why would I do that?" Madoka was aghast. How could Homura sit there with a defiant little smirk and say things like that? How could she be so _resigned_ to that?

"But we both know you won't sit still and suffer in silence. You'll tear me down from my stolen throne sooner or later. I only hope I can give you my best until then."

"Give me your soul gem." Homura wavered, a hint of surprise and fear crumbling her smirk. Madoka jabbed her hand out. "Homura! If you really think you're doomed to be hated and destroyed by the girl you love, then give me your soul gem now and get it over with!"

The only sound in the room was the scythed pendulum ticking back and forth as Homura stared at Madoka's hand, eyes trembling and breath catching. She slowly reached up and plucked her dangling amethyst earring off its frame, then set it in Madoka's waiting palm.

Madoka stared at it. The gem had shifted form when Homura removed it, and now she held a crown-shaped setting made from the blackest material she'd ever seen. In the center, the jewel's violet body was strangled by a thousand mottled, maddened colors swirling atop it. Madoka cupped the precious, precious gem close to her body with both hands. It felt so warm, like she was pressing a hand over Homura's heart. She blinked away a few tears trying to form.

"Back when you were trying to scare me away, you said your wish was to save a puella magi just like me. You said you wished to save her, and then you killed her. And Sayaka says you have time magic. And… and I remember you, Homura. I wasn't sure how before, but I know I remember you." The light of Homura's gem swirled faster the longer she looked into it; her breath caught as she followed it. "I was a puella magi in the past, wasn't I? But I can't imagine I was any good at it. My magic is weak, and I'm such a clumsy crybaby."

Homura shook her head. "You always fought as hard as you could. You never gave up. You tried to help everyone as much as you could. You're too good, Madoka."

"How many times did I die?"

"I lost count."

Madoka looked up from the beautiful gem she held and fixed Homura with her stare. "You said I begged you to kill me. Why?

"We used to become…" Homura swallowed. "Puella magi used to suffer horribly when our gems fully corrupted."

"How many times did I ask something so selfish?"

"Too many."

"How many times did you have to do that to me?"

Homura's throat locked up, and her next words came out as a whisper. "Too many."

"And your wish was to go back and save me after the first time I died. So you kept doing it over and over and over, trying to find a way to keep me alive. You got stronger and colder every time and drifted away from all your friends. Now even the tin soldiers and the little girls like Manuke and Usotsuki listen to you because you're the strongest puella magi. Isn't that right?"

Homura bit her lip, but didn't say anything.

"Did you know they call me a goddess? Manuke does anyway, and they all think I'm important. She tells stories about the goddess and the crying girl, and she says she heard them from your heart." Madoka shook her head. "I'm no one special. I don't know how you could possibly love someone as plain and useless as me so much that you think of me like a goddess."

"You aren't plain and useless! You, you saved me. You cared about me. No one else could."

"Do you really think that much of me?" Homura nodded weakly. Madoka closed her hands around the gem, letting its pulsing warmth enter her. It helped still her nervous shaking. "I may not be a goddess, but let me give you something you can't take yourself. I can forgive you."

"What? You give me…" Homura stiffened, shaking her head. "No, that's impossible. You can't. We've done too much. You can't."

"Did you know? I'm terrified of you, Homura. I have nightmares about you, every single night. Every morning I wake up tired and afraid and never quite remember why, except that you were there. I didn't want to show it too much, but every time we talk I'm so afraid you're going to grab me and not let me go, and I won't be able to endure it." Madoka took a deep breath and began sliding closer on the couch.

Homura pulled herself up and scrambled back. "So run! Run away from me, live your life where I can't hurt you!"

"I can't. I mustn't. There's so much happening and I'm so confused, but I know that for sure. I mustn't run away from what scares me, and I mustn't leave you alone." Madoka set Homura's soul gem down gently on the table; Homura shuddered, eyes wide and tense, as Madoka reached out and took her hands. "You're trembling, Homura."

"I'm scared." Her breath came in shudders, and she couldn't peel her eyes away from the girl leaning in toward her.

"Tell me why?"

"You. You'll undo me. You'll tear down my resolve. I have to do this, I have to take this path. Don't tempt me away from it, please."

"Let's make a deal, Homura. I'll forgive you for everything you had to do. I can do that, but then you have to stop running away on your own. Stop fighting Sayaka and trying to scare off all the others. You have to come be our friend again."

"How? How can you say that knowing what I've done?"

"Because you'd never hurt me, because you love me." Madoka twined her fingers between Homura's and pulled them up to her face; she pressed a kiss to the back of Homura's hand. "And because I love you, Homura."

"Let me protect you." There was desperation in Homura's voice. "Give up fighting the wraiths, give up taking the grief of the world on your own shoulders. That's the only way I'll say yes."

"I can't forget about them, but I'll fight them by supporting my friends. That's all I'm strong enough to do. Is that good enough?"

"Yes. Yes, promise it! Promise me!"

"I promise." Madoka slid closer, giggling at the way Homura shook her head like she couldn't believe what was happening. "I'll hold onto you so you're not lonely, and I'll make you warm when your heart is going cold again. I can accept you even when you can't accept yourself."

Homura sank back against the corner of the couch. Her eyes flicked over Madoka's too-close face, drinking in the sight of it. Madoka smiled. "What do you say, Homura? Can we seal our promise with a kiss?"

Homura barely dared to nod, but she did. Madoka, eyes soft and happy, cupped her face and leaned in close. On the table within arms' reach, the kaleidoscopic light of Homura's soul gem outshone the candles in the dark.

Out in the city, the Clara dolls scrambled about, their eyes glowing green or blue as they danced about with sparklers leaving trails of light flashing behind them. One of them ran between firework launchers, setting off a constant rhythm of celebratory booms in the sky above to a chorus of cheers below.

In her apartment, Mami paused as she went through closets for spare bedding to glance out the window at the fireworks erupting over the skyline. She wondered briefly what the occasion was, but went back to work. There were people who needed her here and now, after all. Nagisa sat in the living room watching the fireworks, tea forgotten as she stared out the window to the balcony. As herald of the Law of Cycles, she could sense what other puella magi could not. She felt the witchlike magic of Homura's world thriving and glowing, and wondered what it meant. Okubyou stood balanced on the balcony railing just on the other side of the glass, hopping about and dancing on the slender beam with far more daring than Nagisa had ever seen her.

Kyouko distantly heard the fireworks, but did not realize what they were. She sat beside the bed in Mami's guest bedroom watching over Sayaka's fevered sleep. A pile of grief cubes sat on the nightstand, some of which had already been used to keep the sleeping girl cleansed. A set of damp washcloths sat next to the cubes, doing nothing to control Sayaka's temperature that her natural healing magic wasn't already doing much better, but Kyouko kept laying them on Sayaka's forehead and changing them out anyway in distant hope that they might help _somehow_. Usotsuki regularly snuck through the room to take the dried cloths to the bathroom to run under cold water, and Kyouko was just distracted enough not to realize she never had to get up herself. A phone call had convinced Sayaka's mother the girls were sleeping over at a friend's house, but Kyouko wouldn't rest much tonight.

Incubators slinked here and there throughout the city. Quite a few more broken Incubators lay in shuddering piles, out of sight but present. The functional bodies ignored them except to keep a running total of the number incapacitated; additional nodes could be generated as necessary. They focused instead on investigating the magical noise bombarding their sensory input. Their magical analysis was keener and more complete than Nagisa's, and they knew what it meant. Their burning red eyes watched the heavens as the balance of magic suffusing the world shifted; the devil's magic leapt and ran and swelled, as the goddess's already slumbering magic vanished.

But the Incubators found another presence that burned with the same sensations churning in their hearts; the shadow within the Great Curse also felt the shift in the world, and rumbled in anger.

On the roof of Homura's apartment, Manuke sat with her legs pulled to her chest and stared at the fireworks that tried vainly to cover up the half-moon. She tasted the resounding happiness in the air, but shook her head. "This can't be right," she said to herself. "This can't be happily ever after, can it? The dragon is at the gate and the curses are still unbroken. The night is not yet over."

OoOoO

The devil danced before the tomb of the goddess. Dark feathers drifted about her and skeletal wings flared out behind her as she spun. In the shadows, the girl in the dark dress still lay in a heap with porcelain-pale hands clutching her head through her dark hair.

The likeness of the goddess rising from the stone tomb's face had her arms outstretched in mercy, but they still clasped nothing. Her eyes with their kindness and understanding still saw nothing. The black streaks from Homura clawing at her legs remained, though now the devil stepped close and boldly ran her fingers across the goddess's face.

"She accepts me." The devil laughed with joy, her heart lighter than she could ever remember. Standing on tiptoes, she pressed her lips to the cold stone. "She gives herself to me."

Then she danced backwards and spun again, bringing her hands up to wave through the air. The dark feathers rushed along behind her hands as if caught in a wind, then shone with a deep violet light. When the light faded, the feathers had joined together and transmuted into a chain of black metal. The devil waved, and the chain slithered around the goddess's tomb; with joyful clinking it wove in and around itself until the stone was covered and anchored to the ground around it at fifteen points. The devil pressed herself to the tomb and caressed the image of the pink-gold gem on the goddess's collarbone; a delicately-made lock of black metal sprang up where her hand touched the gem and fixed itself into the chains around it.

She tucked her head next to the goddess's and closed her eyes in contentment. "She loves me."

OoOoO

* * *

Poetry excerpt once again from _Paradise Lost_ , John Milton.

The Clara dolls' German means "God is dead by your hand," and later to Sayaka, "Kill God with your own hand."


	8. Chapter 8

.

 _A/N: If I ever write a chapter this long ever again_

 _for anything_

 _shoot me._

 _Just swoop down from the sky with a Tiro Finale and end me._

 _It will be the kinder path._

 _This chapter brought to you by Magicland! Magicland, for a warm day guaranteed grief-free*!_

 _*Actual grief content may vary._

* * *

 **OoOoO**

 **A Curse Between Us**

 **Chapter 8**

 **OoOoO**

* * *

Madoka's eyes fluttered open and found the familiar ceiling of her room; she sat up, blearily rubbing at her face. For once, the stream of morning sunlight coming in through her window felt warm and comfortable instead of making her tired eyes ache. For once, she actually felt alert and ready. She felt like she actually slept.

No nightmares. No tossing and turning all night long. No need to hold still under the sheets and let her pounding heart calm down after being jerked awake.

It was Sunday, so it would probably be okay to sleep in a little, but… there were things to do, and for once she felt eager to get up and do them. She hadn't gotten any of her homework for the weekend done yet because she'd been so worried about everyone. And after last night, her friends would probably want to rest before their next fight, so maybe they'd want to do something fun together? Then maybe she could tell everyone properly about her and Homura?

Homura…

Madoka rolled back under the covers and grabbed the stuffed animal she'd fallen asleep hugging, a big stuffed seal with ribbons just like her red ones, squeezing it as hard as she could while a stream of giggles bubbled up from her chest. Homura! Homura loved her, and she loved Homura back. Homura was going to stop trying to run everyone off and let Madoka bring her back to their friends. Kyouko would be happy enough, and Sayaka wouldn't like it at first but would come around when she saw Homura really was done trying to be mean. And it seemed like Nagisa and Kyouko's friend Mami were working with everyone last night too, so maybe everyone could be friends and help each other? She hoped so. It would be so much better for all of them.

Homura…

Madoka stayed wrapped up hugging the seal for a few more minutes, feeling the blush radiating off her face and remembering how stunned and happy Homura looked last night after they made their deal, like she couldn't believe she'd found something so good. Well, Madoka was going to make sure they all found good things from now on.

She threw the covers back and stepped out of bed, snapping off her alarm clock just as it began to buzz.

Fifteen minutes and a whirlwind of morning cheer later, the whole family was in the dining room together. "It's nice to see you in such a wonderful mood again," Junko said. Madoka had gotten her Mama up by holding Tatsuya to help him dance around on her head until she budged, and had been irrepressible while the two of them took care of their teeth and hair together—a far cry from the girl who for the past few weeks had barely stumbled downstairs in time for school and just slept in on the weekends.

"It's nice to be in a wonderful mood!" Madoka smiled and sipped at her hot chocolate, special made from Papa. He was still working on her pancakes, but she certainly didn't mind waiting. She'd missed sitting around at breakfast chatting with her parents while Tatsuya tried knocking his food off his high chair and none of them needed to rush off anywhere.

"And it's especially surprising since you were out with your friends so late last night," Junko said between savoring bites of her omelet. She smirked playfully at her daughter and wiggled her eyebrows. "Did something good finally happen to my sweet little daughter?"

"Ehihi, well, there's a girl…" Madoka lifted her hot chocolate again, more to hide behind it than to take a sip. "And I had my first kiss last night! That counts!"

There was a splort as Tomohisa fumbled flipping a pancake and a clatter as Junko's omelet missed her mouth and the fork slipped out her hand. Disappointingly, Tatsuya did not do a spit take with his sippy cup round out the reactions, but that was probably because he'd already seen Madoka and Homura flirting around each other and saw this coming a mile away.

"Then again, you're also at the age where kids start keeping the juicier bits secret from their parents," Junko mused. "It might keep my gray hair count low."

"What? Mama, don't tease me!

OoOoO

Sayaka's eyes crept open and found an unfamiliar yellow ceiling painted with blue flowers. Unfamiliar bed too, no surprise. Not hers, not Madoka's, and she fervently hoped not Homura's. Wait, she recognized this room after all; Mami's guest room? She closed her eyes again, replaying the night before and tracing how she got here.

Ah. Right. She lost again. Not to Homura this time, not directly. Then again, Homura lost too.

She shifted, dislodging a dried-out cloth from her forehead, and felt a weight at her side. Kyouko was on top of the bed; an empty chair sat next to it. She'd probably sat there til she was ready to pass out, then dragged herself onto the bed at the last second. Sayaka reached over and poked Kyouko's nose, who scrunched her face up and reflexively swatted the offending hand away hard. Sayaka laughed quietly. "Sorry I dragged you into my bullshit. You shouldn't have to put up with me."

She reached over for Kyouko's nose again, but this time clamped her whole hand over it. The sleeping girl lasted a few seconds unable to breath before jerking awake and shoving Sayaka away. "What gives?" she demanded. "I was having an awesome dream, there was this huge pizza, and…" She trailed off. "Sayaka!" Kyouko sprung up and landed kneeling right over her. "How're you feeling? The hell happened in there? What gives, you moron, don't go off being a dumbass picking fights like that on your own!"

Sayaka pushed away the red ponytail falling down on her face. "Be nice to me, I'm recovering."

"Oh, I'll be the nicest, dotingest motherfucker you ever had nurse you back to health, dumbass. How the hell do you get a fever anyway, you're a puella magi! What happened in that hellhole?"

Someone knocked lightly at the door, then nudged it open. Mami came in with two bowls of hot soup on a tray, then came to a halt. "Oh! Um. I'll just… come back later!" The dishes rattled as she ditched the tray on the closest dresser and fled.

Kyouko managed to only blush a tiny bit as she moved aside, taking a place next to Sayaka and giving the other girl room to sit up properly. "Well?"

"It wasn't a physical fever, it was... in here," Sayaka touched her head, "and here," she touched the gemmed ring on her finger. "I found the shadow at the center. It's angry."

"Yeah, sorry, but no prize for figuring that one out, Blue."

"It was angry at me, because I dragged Homura out of there instead of killing her."

Kyouko's mouth snapped shut.

"It was pulling my head apart and looking inside. It was…" A shattered city, two girls lying in the tinted water. Red glasses and teary eyes staring at her, pleading. "…shoving in memories that aren't mine."

And others that… were hers, she was sure of it, but she couldn't remember from where. Ramming her sword point into a clockwork shield that had to be Homura's. A knight and a princess dancing around each other in an underwater symphony. Just thinking about that one sent up a white-hot pain right behind her eyes; she pushed her hands over her face and rubbed.

"You were pretty out of it all night. I had no idea what was wrong with you." Kyouko sounded miserable and lost.

Sayaka didn't reply to that. Her dreams last night were dark and cobwebbed, but still just clear enough for her to know she didn't want to remember them any better. The shadow had been there, and its pain and anger clenched around Sayaka's heart all night long and drowning her in memories and feelings that didn't belong in her head. She squeezed her eyes shut. Was the shadow really there with her all night? Or was she just dreaming about it after it practically crushed her?

But one image stood out clearest from all the others, from both the confrontation and the fever dreams: her sword, swaying inches above Homura's gem with blood-pounding anticipation.

"It wants her to pay. Homura, I mean. I had a shot back there, and the shadow wanted me to take it."

Kyouko sat still for a long moment, worrying her lower lip. "Sayaka? Why do you sound like you wish you did?" Sayaka didn't reply and kept her eyes on the bed instead of looking over, but she could see Kyouko's hands shaking out the corner of her eye. "For Christ's sake, Sayaka, will you just fucking talk to me? The hell did Homura _do_ to you?"

Except she couldn't. She couldn't go around throwing half-remembered accusations of impossible things when she didn't have a way of backing up anything she said. Every bit of proof of the previous world ceased to exist when Akemi remade it in her image, and the only people who could back her up were all under Akemi's thumb. Nagisa, the dolls, Kyubey; trying to rely on the last two would just screw everything over worse anyway.

"Breakfast's getting cold," Sayaka said, nodding over at the tray Mami left. She didn't look up to see Kyouko's reaction, but Usotsuki hanging about in the corner shook her head.

She pushed the covers off her side of the bed and gingerly got up, testing her body's recovery. As expected, it took her weight just fine. The problem was never physical, after all. For puella magi, those sorts of problems could practically be ignor—

—Sayaka spun back about and found herself thrown to her knees by the bedside and her head shoved into the comfy bedsheets as Kyouko forced her arm into a lock and threw her down.

"Wha—"

"I busted a guy's arms in two places once," Kyouko interrupted. "Well, you know, maybe that's not the only time I roughed someone up, but there's one particular idiot I'm thinking of right now. Held him like this and punched him on the back of his elbow," Kyouko tapped Sayaka on the same spot. "Then bashed him again about six inches higher." She lightly chopped at Sayaka's arm closer to the shoulder. "Made a nice big crunch. Aaaand maybe I thought about ripping his goddamn legs off, but I didn't, 'cause he needed those to get outta my sight. See, this jackass found an old burnt-out church in a bad part of town, locals wouldn't go near it, and thought hey, what a perfect spot for setting up drug deals! Cops don't care about this place at all, just need to run off the scrawny homeless girl camping out there first, no problem. Dumbass never knew what hit him."

"Is there a point to this?" Sayaka mumbled into the bed with as much good nature as she could muster.

"I'll tell you the point. Point is, yeah, I never killed anyone and I'm glad I didn't, but I can think of plenty situations where I would've back then. So if you're expecting me to go all oh noooo, Sayaka wanted to hurt cute little Homura, Sayaka's supposed to be better'n that, how can I trust her ever again?... don't. Just don't. You might be crazy, but I can still out-drama you."

Sayaka chuckled, and felt better. Only a tiny bit, but genuinely better. "Sorry. I'm getting shortsighted again, aren't I? I can only plead a terminal case of stupid."

"Yeah, well long as you know." Kyouko let go, letting Sayaka up again. "Now what say we do something about that breakfast Mami made?

OoOoO

"And you believe… Akemi is the origin of the shadow?" Mami asked. Sayaka nodded.

The four of them—Mami, Sayaka, Kyouko, and Nagisa—sat around the table in Mami's living room, going over Sayaka's report on her misadventures in the Great Curse the night before. As always there were tea and snacks at hand, but even Kyouko was paying too much attention to the discussion to bother with snacks. Nagisa was the only one touching them, and keeping her silence as she watched the others intently.

Sayaka had gone over her and Akemi's approach through the wraiths in the miasma, Akemi's collapse at the labyrinth entrance, passing Akemi off to Kyouko, and what she saw inside the shadow's labyrinth. She did not mention Kyubey, the Clara dolls, or the opportunity she almost took to cut down Akemi, nor did she mention the memories she saw when the shadow touched her—her memories, or the shadow's. Kyouko caught the omissions and shot her an upset look at realizing Sayaka didn't fully trust Mami, but that was okay. Kyouko already knew she wasn't trusting anyone with the full story of anything right now.

Case in point: in the corners of the room, where only Sayaka and Nagisa seemed to notice them, Usotsuki and Okubyou sat playing a clapping game together.

"I'll admit that I don't know Akemi well at all," Mami said. "She made it plain she preferred to keep distance between us, and we mostly stayed out of each other's territory after our first dealings. She doesn't seem like the sort of girl who's living with curses in her heart strong enough to release a shadow. She's too… calm, I suppose. Too cold and controlled to be consumed with that much anguish—though again, I don't know her well."

"Calm and controlled, you know, I can think of another girl who answers to that description, but we know she's spawned a shadow before too," Kyouko said, and shot a very direct look at her old mentor.

For a second, Mami suddenly looked very small and frail. "I guess… I guess I believed it coming from Akemi?"

"Trust me on this one. She might not look it, but Homura's as screwed up as the rest of us."

"You've worked with her more, then?"

"Worked with? Eh, you could say that, if you had a totally dysfunctional idea of working together. It was mostly me 'n Sayaka dealing with her. We had a few times where I was standing around waiting to see which of 'em was gonna start biting first, and the three of us took down a bunch of wraiths together once too. Me 'n Pinkie went to the mall with her, that was fun. Oh, and there was this one time she shot my knee out and I broke her nose." Nagisa suddenly choked on her cookie at that, but Kyouko just shrugged. "It was cool, we had a sleepover after."

On the other hand, Mami and Sayaka were both used to Kyouko and didn't bat an eye. Mami rubbed at Nagisa's back to help the coughing and asked, "Pinkie?"

"Oh, you haven't met her yet, right." Kyouko grinned. "Sweet girl, real adorable, don't piss her off or she'll eat your face. She's Sayaka's bestie since they were kids, and Homura's got the biggest crush on her. And, eh, something's up with her. Sayaka probably knows more."

Sayaka, naturally, wasn't saying a thing.

Mami gave a minute huff and turned back to Kyouko. "You've taken Akemi's measure better than I have, then. But one this powerful? I'm aware that she's strong, but… Sayaka, I don't doubt your account, but the idea that the Great Curse is a shadow capable of drawing and sustaining that many wraiths is… Well, how many puella magi that powerful can there possibly be? It's just as likely that this is an ancient shadow that's grown stronger over centuries."

"You really don't believe me, do you?" Sayaka leaned onto the table toward Mami. "Akemi blasted her way through the wraiths guarding the Curse, you know, the ones we barely ran away from with our hides in one piece? Me and Homura didn't charge into the Curse with a swarm chasing behind us, we didn't sneak in, I didn't help her fight, we just waltzed in and she shot down all comers."

"But… but that many? How? What sort of girl would have that kind of power? Why isn't she out using it? No girl could have a wish that powerful without having something she wants to use it for, that just isn't how wishes work."

"Kyouko's seen her pull this kind of thing before too." Sayaka jerked her head toward her partner.

"Right, back in the park when Pinkie was doing her seizure thing," Kyouko said. Mami pursed her lips at the mention of one more thing she didn't understand, but didn't interrupt. "There were like forty wraiths trying to swarm Pinkie, so Homura did her timestop thing—you've seen that?—and blasted them in one shot. She could've nuked a whole goddamn city block with that spell and didn't even look strained. Lit up the sky and called down arrows like it was raining purple hellfire. I can totally believe she went up against all the wraiths in the Curse and snapped 'em over her skinny little knee."

Mami took a sip of her tea to pause for thought before going on. "If I can pry a little, then—why did you not try recruiting Akemi for our raid in the first place?"

Kyouko shrugged. "Me 'n Pinkie both tried getting Homura onboard already. She didn't want nothing to do with any of us."

"And I had… reasons to believe she didn't care about the Great Curse," Sayaka added, then frowned. "I might've been wrong on those, though."

From the corner of the room, Usotsuki paused in her game with Okubyou to shoot Sayaka a pointed look in caution.

"And why last night, then?" Mami asked. "What changed that the two of you suddenly went in there together?"

Usotsuki shook her head. Sayaka smirked at Mami. "Who knows what that lunatic thinks? She decided she wanted in for her own lousy reasons. She offered, I thought she could maybe pull it off, I accepted."

"And then she found the entrance to the shadow and collapsed. And this is why you believe the shadow is hers?" Mami asked.

"There's more."

Kyouko and Mami waited, both of them sensing that they were skirting around the very edge of something key to all of Sayaka's secrets. Nagisa stopped nibbling at the snacks, eyes fearfully jumping between Sayaka and the corner where the Clara dolls' game crashed to a halt.

"Wraiths come from the curses in the human heart, don't they?" Sayaka asked.

"And shadows from the curses harbored in the souls of puella magi," Mami answered.

Sayaka smirked again, the same one she always wore when she refused to admit the existence of the millstone hanging from her neck. "Guilt would do it, right? The shadow wanted Homura to pay. She's got a lot to regret."

Usotsuki scrambled forward, making Nagisa squeak in fright. Kyouko and Mami's eyes didn't so much as flick toward the Clara doll as it grabbed Sayaka's shoulder and hissed in her ear. "You go too far, angel. Stop this now, for your own good!"

"Like what?" Kyouko demanded.

"She knows." Sayaka pointed her smirk at the table. "That's enough."

Kyouko frowned and shot Sayaka a glare that promised forcible gut-spilling later, at spearpoint if necessary, even as Nagisa sighed quietly in relief and Usotsuki let go and went back to her corner.

Realizing Sayaka had already said more than she meant to, Mami changed the subject. "Pinkie's been mentioned several times now. Is she puella magi?"

"Nah, her magic's not strong enough to be worth the contract to Kyubey," Kyouko answered, and got a dumb grin on her face. "Kaname Madoka's her name. Seriously, you do not understand what I mean when I say how adorable she is. She's like the essence of pink."

"She's your friend since childhood, Sayaka. Is there anything you want to add?"

At least three people in the room were sick of that smirk on her face again. Sayaka was, and she didn't even have to see it. "I owe her," was all she said. Mami and Kyouko waited for more, but nothing was coming.

"I see," Mami said, and clearly didn't. "Well, the thing to discuss next is what we do about the Great Curse."

"Well we've got a chance now!" Sayaka leaned forward, suddenly eager to talk again now they were on safer ground. "Akemi obliterated the wraiths outside the labyrinth. We can get inside without running a gauntlet. Next we head in there and take the fight to the shadow's home ground."

Mami and Kyouko shared a look that clearly said _'oh shit, knew this was going to happen, but still oh shit'_. It was both strange and familiar to see Kyouko doing that with someone who wasn't her. "There are other options too," Mami said, trying to sound as reassuring as possible. "If we believe Akemi's connected, then it may be worth trying to speak with her to learn more."

"Akemi? Are you serious?" Sayaka expected some pushback, but not even going inside? "We nearly break out necks trying to fight in there the first time and now the gate's wide open you want to run off and spend more time _talking_?"

"If we have less dangerous avenues unexplored, then certainly."

"Akemi isn't going to give you scraps," Sayaka hissed. "She's been more than clear about that, and Kyouko and me have both got in brawls with her to prove it. She doesn't give a damn what any of us have to say, but the shadow's wide open, we should go straight for it—"

"And then what?" Kyouko demanded, half-rising from her seat. "Fine, the wraiths are gone for now. There's a whole other fucked up version of Mitakihara in the labyrinth, and you made it sound like we had three or four different kinds of monsters in there trying to slaughter each other across the place. Get past all that, and you still have the shadow itself. Did you even fight it? Did you even _see_ it? 'Cause from what you said, it sounded like it glanced in your general direction and you fell over and went crazier than normal. Is that what you're saying is a better idea than having another chat with the ice queen? Go get your brain pulled out your eye sockets again by some city-sized monster? 'Cause I know Twintails is a pain in the ass, but I never saw you pass out and spend all night thrashing around like a sick toddler just from talking to her."

Mami grabbed her arm. " _Kyouko!_ " After a second Kyouko sat back down, and Mami turned to Sayaka. "We won't let the Great Curse regain any ground. We shift part of our nightly hunting to the empty area of the miasma. Its dark energy will begin to draw wraiths from the city again, but if we cut them down every night instead of letting them feed on the Curse we can keep the city clean and keep the way to the shadow's labyrinth open. We'll be able to go back in as soon as we're ready."

"I'm ready now!" Sayaka all but exploded. "I've been waiting for this for too long, I'm not stopping right when Akemi's shadow is exposed!" Sayaka punched a fist to the table and leaned in. "Didn't you want to defend this city, Mami? Don't you want that monster gone? Are you just going to sit here and—"

Kyouko stood up and grabbed Sayaka by the collar in one motion. "Scuse us," she called back. Sayaka didn't fight it, and saw Mami half-rise, then sink back down with a worried look on her face as Kyouko dragged her from the room. Seconds later they were back in the guest bedroom, and Kyouko slammed the door behind them and spun Sayaka into the wall. Drywall creaked behind her from the weight.

" _Do you not care_?" Kyouko nearly shouted. "Do you not care that last night you were lying there in a labyrinth, dead to rights until Nagisa flew in and dragged you out? Do you not care how fast you're going to martyr yourself?" Kyouko sucked breath through gritted teeth. "Do you not care how suicidal you're acting? 'Cause you know what, I do, I sure as fucking hell care!"

"None of you can know—"

"Fuck!" Kyouko screamed. "Yeah, damn right I don't know what you're dealing with! You know why? 'Cause you won't fucking tell me!"

Sayaka shook her head. "I can't—"

"Can't, won't, what's the goddamn difference?" For a second Sayaka was sure Kyouko was about to start throwing punches, but Kyouko let go and moved back, breathing deep as she looked away. After a moment, she half-turned back toward Sayaka. "Is the world ending tonight?"

Sayaka blinked. "Huh?"

"Is the goddamn world going up in flames tonight?" Kyouko asked, enunciating each word clearly. "Are we staring down the face of the apocalypse in the next twenty-four hours? Final trumpet sounds, magical girl Jesus descends from the heavens clothed in red robes and wreathed in flame to wrap up the world like a scroll, or even just the city? 'Cause if that's what you're staring down right now and there's no time left, then I will charge in and face down the Four Horsemen with you."

Kyouko moved back toward her and put her hands out, halfway between shrugging and reaching for Sayaka. "But if we're not? If whatever you're dealing with isn't about to kill us all, then maybe don't be in such a damn hurry to off yourself. Please. Just, just let me have a go at Homura first. I'm afraid here, Sayaka. I am genuinely and truly pissing my pants here that you aren't thinking straight right now and you're going to get yourself killed. Me. Me, Sakura Kyouko, isolationist bitch extraordinaire. I forgot what it's like to care this much til you came along so just… please. Don't take you away from me like this."

Sayaka gnawed at her lip a moment. "I think you've yelled at me about this before."

"Probably, yeah."

"I'll wait."

Kyouko raised her hands in front of her. "That's all I'm asking for."

"She won't tell you anything," Sayaka promised. "She won't tell you anything. She won't tell any of us anything."

Kyouko eyed her like Sayaka was trying to wriggle away. "But you're still gonna to wait."

"Yeah. I'm just saying."

Kyouko held her gaze a moment longer til she was sure, then nodded. "You let me handle Homura. I… I'm gonna…" She looked away, kneading her forehead. "I need some air, it's goddamn hot in here."

Kyouko beat a fast retreat out the room. Sayaka drifted out to the hallway in her vanishing wake, and found Nagisa waiting there wringing her hands and flicking her ringed eyes up to Sayaka. She heard everything, of course; there was no way she hadn't. 'Course, the same probably applied to Mami on the other side of the apartment.

"Nagisa? You need something?"

As soon as she was acknowledged, Nagisa darted forward, long white hair bouncing all around her, and clamped her arms around Sayaka's middle and squeezed. "Don't give up," she pleaded. "I'm afraid of what happens if you give up."

After a moment, Sayaka slid her arms around Nagisa's shoulders and hugged back, holding the younger girl tight. Familiar. So familiar. Somewhere, sometime, this girl had been her ally. "Don't worry about me," Sayaka whispered. "I'm not going down anytime soon."

OoOoO

Kyouko shifted her stick of pocky around, as always somehow speaking clearly even with food in her mouth. "Where're we meeting everyone again?"

"Fountain in the plaza in front of the entrance." Sayaka rifled through the packet of information she'd printed off the net before they set out walking here, relying on Kyouko to steer her along the sidewalk.

"Magicland." Kyouko snorted. "Now here's a question, when puella magi go to a theme park called Magicland, is it fitting or is it ironic, of the dumbass 'what even the hell' variety?"

Without looking up from her papers, Sayaka reached over and rapped her knuckles on Kyouko's skull. "It's cute, of the 'Kyouko was bouncing around like a puppy the minute Sayaka got off the phone with Madoka' variety."

"I was not!"

Sayaka glanced over and waggled her eyebrows. "You're skipping," she singsonged.

And Kyouko's gait smoothed itself out immediately. "Screw you."

"It's okay to act like a little kid now and then."

"Hmph."

"We all know you've got the self-control of one."

"Oi, there they are," Kyouko said loudly, nodding toward their friends.

After heading back to the Miki place, Sayaka got a call from Madoka asking if they wanted to meet up at a local theme park and if she could have Kyouko call up Mami to invite her and Nagisa too. Sayaka didn't mind, and despite the crap she was giving Kyouko, she was happy seeing her friend get so excited about something so simple. From the way Kyouko told it, she didn't have much time for anything like this when she was actually a kid.

The entrances and ticket booths were set into a stone castle wall that had ivy carefully tended to grow all along its face and a line of sculpted figures sitting near the top. Princes with swords, princesses with magic scepters, kings and queens, giants and goblins, all looked down over the gathered crowd filing their way in. In the center of the plaza a dragon with a wizard riding its back coiled up into a fountain, with streams of water sprouting out its mouth, its taloned forearms, and the wizard's hat and staff.

Madoka and Nagisa stood talking in front of the fountain, Nagisa happily jumping up and down and waving her arms while Madoka followed her story eagerly. Mami and Homura were both there already too, Homura seeming studiously indifferent and Mami with a fixed look of general undirected pleasantness, both of them standing behind the person they came here with. Kyouko snorted at that; they both looked so wrong-footed, but showed it so differently. Mami, at least, didn't have to wait long; Nagisa ran behind her and shoved her up to Madoka, then latched onto her side. Nagisa then launched into an introduction, probably going on about how bold and warm and beautiful her big sis Mami was.

Kyouko reached for Madoka's mind with a telepathic tap on the shoulder. _'The aliens are back, Pink One. They still want their lost princess's best friend's roommate.'_

Her mind grasped at nothingness; it was like reaching for a hand and stumbling over a ledge instead. Madoka didn't so much as look around.

Kyouko stopped in place. Sayaka slowed too, tearing her eyes away from Homura to look a question at Kyouko. "Brainwaves with Pinkie ain't working," Kyouko explained. "Hey! Oi, Pigtails!"

That got her attention; Madoka looked over and waved happily. "Kyouko! Sayaka! I'm so glad you're here, come over! I already got our entrance passes, and Mama let me spring for VIP passes so we can skip some lines."

They came over and joined the group, taking the passes Madoka handed them. An awkward pause descended as Kyouko and Sayaka looked at Homura, and Homura stared back impassively, looking even more out of her element than before.

Kyouko didn't do awkward silence. "So last time I checked, Twintails here was still an edgelord sulking off in dark alleyways," she said. "It's not April Fools, is it?"

"W-well," Madoka began, "Homura and I had a long talk last night…" A faint blush crept over her, while Homura looked afraid the blushing might be contagious and was ready to bolt.

It was funny, Kyouko thought, how much you could read off Homura's different flavors of stiff faces once you got used to them.

"A-about lots of things," Madoka went on, "Like why she acts like she does and what sort of problems we have and how we got here and why and what to do about it and, and promises, and, um…" She cut off her rambling, took a deep breath, and tried again. "Anyway, Homura's going to be nicer and spend more time with us and cooperate better on puella magi things!"

Everyone swiveled their heads from Madoka to Homura. The mighty were brought low indeed, as Homura stood there faintly sweating until Madoka jabbed her elbow into Homura's side, making her jump. "T-that's right!" Homura said, and bowed. "I hope we can all get along!"

Kyouko leaned in to Sayaka. "You know, I want to smug about this," she said quietly, "But I can't. No sane person coulda seen this coming."

Madoka pulled Homura upright and hugged her arm. "Also, Homura and I are dating now!"

Kyouko whooped, then catcalled, then punched a fist in the air. "About damn time!"

Homura's fears had been realized; Madoka's blushing was indeed contagious and had spread to infect her. Worse, she couldn't even bolt with Madoka anchoring her down like this.

"Congratulations," Mami told them. "It's always nice to see a puella magi finding a bit of happiness."

"Um, yeah!" Nagisa echoed, uncertain.

Sayaka just looked like Madoka punched her in the face.

Madoka bit her lip, then let go of Homura to grab Sayaka's hand. "I'm sorry everyone, can Sayaka and I have a minute?" She tugged her best friend away to a bench on the other side of the plaza; she sat with her back to the others, and Sayaka sank down beside her.

"Why?" Sayaka asked. "Why end it like this?"

Madoka hesitated; that wasn't what she expected. "What do you mean? We haven't finished anything."

Sayaka grabbed her arm just below the shoulder, suddenly looking angry. "Are you really content staying here?"

"I—I don't understand?"

"HERE, Madoka. Here with Akemi!"

"I… Sayaka, I finally figured it out, Homura was looping through time. She was trying to keep me alive and safe. I used to be puella magi like everyone else, but I… I was never any use or any good at it. But this way I can help everyone! I can help Homura heal, and I can take away the reason she has to fight everyone."

Sayaka shook her head, looking as confused as Madoka was. "That's not how I heard it," she muttered, then her eyes flicked off to the side to an empty space. She pushed on quickly, sharp and accusing. "Do you really trust her, Madoka? Do you really believe what she tells you?"

"Yes, I do!" She wiggled free from Sayaka's grip and put her hands gently on her friend's shoulders instead, looking into her eyes. "Homura is… so much softer than she forces herself to be. Kinder, and more fragile. She doesn't want to live like this. She really doesn't. I'll put her back together, and then she won't have to be anybody's enemy anymore. She's already promised me that! She's really happy this is happening, I can tell. She doesn't want to be our enemy, she wants to be our friend."

"Do you really mean to take responsibility for her, then?" Sayaka snarled. "Keep her in a kennel and take her to the vet when she's sick and make sure she doesn't bite anyone?"

Madoka flinched. "Sayaka! Don't be mean about it!"

"Do you?" she demanded. "If it turns out she's rabid, do you really mean to leash yourself to her?"

"If that's how you insist on putting it… then, yes! If I can fix her, then I will! If I can stop her from fighting with all my other friends, then I will! If I can make her happy and all I have to do is give her myself, then I will!"

Sayaka went still, staring at Madoka like there was nothing left to do and nothing left to save. She didn't say anything.

"I love her, Sayaka," Madoka said in a small voice, begging her to understand. "I want her to be happy. I want all of you to be happy. This is the only way I can do that."

Sayaka slumped enough that her hair fell over her face, hiding it. She went almost slack; Madoka was afraid if she let go of Sayaka's shoulders, she'd fall over. Right when she was ready to lean down where she could see her friend's face again, Sayaka let out a laugh. "Well okay then!" she said. "If you're sure and it's settled, then that's great!"

"Um, Sayaka?"

She laughed again, longer and louder with an edge of hysteria that Madoka didn't like at all. She jerked up straight, a big grin on her face. "What are you waiting for? Magicland awaits! Let's go have a fun day like the big happy team we all are!"

"Sayaka, are you ok-AY!"

Madoka didn't have time to stew in anxiety about her best friend's sudden switch, because Sayaka sprung up and dragged Madoka with her before taking off at a run toward the others. Madoka winced; it felt like Sayaka was going to pull her arm off at the elbow. "Wait, slow down! You're hurting me!" Then Madoka's arm was free; she wasn't sure if her wriggling did it or Sayaka let go, but she stumbled to a slower pace while Sayaka hurtled on.

Collision was imminent; the only one facing the oncoming assault and thus forewarned was Homura, and her only reaction was to trace the line of Sayaka's dash to its target and scoot slightly to the side. Her resigned face said that yes, it was in fact _always_ like this with these two idiots.

Then Sayaka tackled Kyouko out from between Mami and Nagisa, rolled with her up to their feet again, spun her like a dance partner, and sprinted for the entrance with a shouting, protesting redhead in her wake. "Last one in's a rotten Incubator!" Sayaka called back.

OoOoO

The crowds weren't that terrible for a Sunday afternoon with good weather, so Sayaka had room to run through the broad cobblestone walkways, with Kyouko still dragged behind her. "We need some massive ride first! Start it off with a bang! Ha! Something that'll shoot us across the park and make us think we're about to splatter all over the ground. What could compare with fighting wraiths though, right?"

"Damn it! Slow down, you blue jackass! The hell's gotten into you?"

Nagisa was almost keeping pace with them, maybe two steps behind. "…and then the Snow Queen's Sleigh, and then we stop for ice cream, and then arcade games, and then another roller coaster, and then launch on the Beanstalk…"

Madoka, Homura, and Mami dashed along behind them, weaving in and out of the crowd like bodyguards at a fast jog to try to keep Sayaka close and in sight in case they needed to intervene. "What set her off like this?" Mami asked as they ran.

"I'm sorry, it was something I said about Homura. I didn't mean for this to happen!"

Cheerful pink and a dark purple were the main colors of Magicland. How much of one or the other there was shifted as they moved around the park, one being used for the main coloring and the other for accents, and the balance between the two showed whether the fairy tales in this particular part of the park were more Happily Ever After or Deep Dark Woods. Here the atmosphere of the park was still mostly balanced between the two extremes. The shops, booths, and rest stops were all brightly colored half-timbered constructions mashed together in tight rows that looked right out of a historical district from France or Germany, though with much broader walkways; then the tight stack of booths would suddenly give way to wide plazas in front of larger buildings imitating castles or cathedrals. Here and there the semi-historical feel broke up for the obviously modern architecture of the enormous rides, where a giant beanstalk or the roller-coaster flight path of a chorus of angels sprung up in the middle of the faux-city.

Sayaka skid to a stop, yanked Kyouko around and ran back ten steps, then whistled appreciatively at the open air obstacle course bearing the name Adventure Academy. Half army training course, half masochistic parkour run, the Adventure Academy was a monument of castle climbing walls, swashbuckling swing ropes, stepping stones shaped like clouds, and timed jumping puzzles that had dragon heads knocking off the unwary and unlively. The course was split up into several routes depending on difficulty; the queue for the hardest course was almost nonexistent, the lesser mortals having fled.

"This," Sayaka declared. "This is what we came for. This is our purpose."

Kyouko opened and closed her mouth a few times, then shrugged. "You know what? I was gonna talk you out of doing anything while you're like this, but it's not like anything here can hurt us. What're we gonna do, fall and break our necks?"

"That's the spirit!" Sayaka slapped her shoulder and dashed for the line. "Come on, keep up or I'll crush you!"

Mami, catching up along with Madoka and Homura, nabbed Nagisa by the shoulder. "I don't think you're allowed on this one, stay here and cheer them on with us."

"What? Why?"

Mami pointed to a sign by the entrance warning away the short, the young, the pregnant, and anyone with health problems like asthma, back or neck injuries, epilepsy, or heart problems. Nagisa whined in disappointment, but pressed herself up to the low fence to watch while Sayaka and Kyouko took their starting positions.

"I'll buy us some crepes while they play," Homura said, nodding to a nearby booth.

Madoka looked around in surprise. "Are you sure?"

"Being with Kyouko is the best thing for her now," Homura said, shrugging minutely. "They'll be fine."

The two took off on the mark, almost flying up a castle wall with borderline inhuman dexterity. Nagisa started cheering immediately, shouting for them to go faster or just jump over the entire course. Madoka joined in, calling encouragement. She was a worrywart; she knew she was. Maybe she just had to let Sayaka deal with this in her own way.

OoOoO

"Soooo, who finished first and who slipped on the balance bridge because she was rushing?"

"Screw you."

Kyouko grinned. "And that's why you should keep your head doing these things. So what I'd win?"

Sayaka snorted and elbowed her in the ribs. "I'll buy a cotton candy and split it with you."

Their friends met them at the exit, Madoka and Homura passing them crepes and Nagisa jumping around shouting about how cool they were while Mami warmly asked if they had as much fun as it looked.

Kyouko paused as she took the crepe Madoka offered her, studying the other girl. Things got a little nuts with Sayaka losing it, but now she had time to wonder about telepathy not working with Madoka earlier. Madoka's magic presence had been thin and faint before, something almost unnoticeable at range unless you were familiar with it and looking, but now Kyouko couldn't read anything at all off her.

"Um… Kyouko? Is there something on my face?" Madoka looked down at her crepe. "Did I get whipped cream on my cheek?"

"You know what? I can't think of a good excuse to make this look smooth 'n' natural, so just hold still a minute." Kyouko leaned over and grabbed Madoka in a one-armed hug, pushing magic into her the same as if she was trying to work healing, just like she had when Madoka was having a seizure-or-whatever-the-hell back when wraiths were chasing her in the park.

She dove, barely taking a moment to ask Madoka's bones and muscles and veins and nerves and organs if they were okay and get a sense of rightness back. She dove, trying to get past the physical and find the soul that wove throughout and underneath all of it. Last time she tried this she found a crack or wound or break, like something'd been cut off and left a bleeding injury, at the very bottom of her spirit in a sea of molten gold magic Madoka couldn't possibly have.

"T-that tingles, Kyouko!" Madoka said faintly, holding on to her.

Nothing. No gap, no cut, no crack, no window, no molten gold.

What the hell did _that_ even mean? She didn't imagine all of it before, but where'd it go?

Kyouko let go, and Madoka backed up with a faint smile. "What was that all about?"

She shrugged. "I just wanted to hug a cute girl." Madoka giggled, sure there was more to it but amused anyway, and Kyouko glanced over at Homura. _'Hey Twintails, I've got questions later.'_

Homura's only reply was to incline her head, apparently content to let it sit til later, and Kyouko smacked Sayaka's arm. "Thanks for the crepe. Now let's go, this dork owes me victor's spoils."

Everyone else set up at a table and ate their crepes, then when Kyouko and Sayaka got back with a poof of blueberry cotton candy they pulled out their pamphlets and maps and tried to figure out who wanted to do what and go where. Sayaka and Kyouko sat a few feet away from the rest of the group; Kyouko remembered to shout out a list of what she wanted to do, Sayaka mostly just put her head on Kyouko's shoulder and swiped puffs of cotton as the other girl tried to eat them. That devolved into a fight almost immediately, which ended with Sayaka sitting on Kyouko's back to pin her down and feeding her cotton candy by hand. When everyone was ready to go, Kyouko snagged her hand and squeezed; after a moment, Sayaka twined their fingers, and they walked tight together.

OoOoO

After general sightseeing, they headed into the pink end of the park and found a building called Perfect Portraiture where they could get photos taken in costume. There was a brief debate on the merits of pants and princely outfits, but Mami's idea of princess ball gowns for everyone prevailed, which was why Kyouko emerged from the changing rooms feeling like someone's little pet dog stuck in a red handbag, cute and fluffy and completely unable to move. Seriously, what was the point of all this cloth? Skirts, sure, but make 'em short or cut for free movement. She didn't get how puella magi who ended up with full dresses as their uniform were possibly supposed to get anything done. What if she needed to go roofhopping?

"Oh Kyouko, you're so beautiful!" Madoka rushed forward to grab her hands and get a better look. "I'm jealous of all your hair, it looks so nice like this."

"Mami's idea," Kyouko explained. She'd undone her ponytail on Mami's suggestion, letting her long hair fall freely over her bare shoulders and fixing her black hair bow to the bosom of the red dress. She'd never looked so… primpy before. The dresses she wore to church as a kid were a far cry away from this.

"Well it's lovely!" Madoka said. She was in a pink dress with ruffled layers down the skirt and straps over the shoulder, and had kept her hair the same; for how excited she was, she looked like she ought to be running happily through a windy meadow. Way more suited to this than Kyouko.

"It is quite lovely," Mami added, and smiled. "We haven't even reached the sets yet, but this is already fun." She sat demurely in a row of chairs by the exit in a way that made the waiting room seem like a palace; of course she could make a little costume off the rack at a theme park seem like a regal work of art. Her dress was gold, naturally, and had faint embroidered flowers running down the elbow-length sleeves, over the shoulders, and along the bosom and sides of the skirt. She'd somehow found time to do her hair up in complex braids weaving around her head, with just enough loose to give it a flowing look. Probably magic, the cheater.

Kyouko looked over for Sayaka, who was leaning against the wall. "Um, yeah, it's great," Sayaka said, suddenly looking away. "You look great." To go with her powder blue dress, Sayaka had draped a cloak over her shoulders, just like the one she wore with her puella magi uniform, but a little shorter and navy blue instead of white. In fact, it was otherwise _exactly_ like her cloak, down to the gold trim and crown pattern on the neck. Was Kyouko the only one who didn't think of cheating?

She took some comfort in the way Sayaka was still leaning up against the wall with crossed arms like she didn't know quite what to do in a nice dress either. Tomboys unite and all that. Kyouko found herself wishing she'd pushed a little harder for pants. Sayaka in some of those fancy old-timey suits like the princes wore in Disney shows, with a tight military cut. Sayaka in a modern suit, strolling down the city street throwing her a wink. Sayaka, tossing her suit jacket over her shoulder with one hand while she held one of her swords loose in the other, smiling rakishly and ready to bust up some punks.

"S-so you all look good too!" Kyouko squeaked. "Homura and Nagisa not out yet?"

 _'Maaami,'_ Nagisa sent to the group, _'I think I need some help with my dress.'_

 _'I'll be there in just a moment,'_ Mami replied as she rose.

Kyouko had an idea. _'Kid, you mind if Sayaka helps you instead?'_

 _'That's fine…'_

To Mami's questioning look, Kyouko said, "You and Madoka met earlier, but you haven't really talked at all yet, right? Sayaka'll help Nagisa, I'll go see what's holding Homura up, and you two get to know each other."

Mami and Madoka didn't voice any complaints right away, and Sayaka… was calmer than earlier, thank fuck. So Kyouko beat a path back to the changing rooms, Sayaka splitting off to find Nagisa.

Kyouko found the room she saw Homura go in earlier and knocked. "Hey Twintails, you waiting for me?" The sound of unlocking came through, and the door slid open for Kyouko to step in.

Kyouko stopped as soon as she got in. It was usually somewhere in the back of her mind, but Kyouko didn't often pause to consider that these friends of hers were pretty easy on the eyes. She was especially likely to forget in Homura's case, because half the time when she showed up Kyouko was worrying about other things like "Will Blue try to stab Twintails?" and "Will Twintails turn Blue into an arrow pincushion?"

Homura stood before the mirror, inspecting her deep purple dress. She ran a thumb over the silver thread in the wrists of her long sleeves; the same silver ran along the bottom of the skirt and all along the front from waist to neckline, distantly suggesting spider webs. With the dark color and that pattern, the fairy tale dress was probably meant for a witch of the sort that stood around asking mirrors questions about the fairest in the land, but Homura's statuesque poise and imperious, crafted features made even that silly idea seem dignified. Kyouko'd heard the normies chattering at school about what a beauty Homura was, and used to roll her eyes at them for fanboying and fangirling over someone they knew nothing about. She had to admit, though—they were kinda right.

Homura turned her head to the side, frowning distantly at her reflection. "I think I'm supposed to do something with my hair, but I don't remember what. Braids seem wrong for this somehow. Was there another way I wore my hair?"

Kyouko swallowed. "Mami'll think of something if you ask her."

"Mami. Yes, she could, couldn't she? She's good at that." Homura pulled a hand through her hair, sending it rustling, and turned away from the mirror. "You want to talk."

"Yeah. Sayaka told me what happened when you two went in the Curse last night. You collapsed, she had a shot at you she kinda wanted to take."

"Yet she didn't," Homura reminded her. "That surprised me, even if it's not her style."

Too flippant, Kyouko thought with a frown. Sayaka was on an edge there last night, and Homura's making almost-jokes about it. "She also told me there's some girl's shadow inside the Curse, and it was pissed she didn't take that shot."

That got Homura's attention; she looked almost eager. "Miki went into the labyrinth, didn't she? What did she see?"

"A screwed-up version of Mitakihara. City burning, a bunch of different kinds of grief monsters trying to kill each other. And, you know, the shadow turned her skull inside out while she was there."

"Hm."

"Sayaka thinks it's _your_ shadow," she pressed.

Homura paused to think, running her hands along each other slowly as she did. "A shadow. Mine? I think I would notice becoming such a thing, but then, I thought the same about witches."

"Witches? The hell is—" Kyouko broke off with a huff. "Look, do you legit try to sound opaque and sketchy as hell? 'Cause that's what I'm getting here."

"And the shadow wanted me dead," Homura went on, ignoring the reasonable question. "And I can't even defend myself by claiming I've never wanted to die." She caught the look of pained recognition Kyouko gave her, and smiled with bleak amusement at the way she blanched. "It's natural enough a thought for those who suffer too long, isn't it? You can't tell me you never thought it when you were alone on the streets with only your bitter memories to feed you and keep you company. Yet, here we both are. I think we've done well."

"So we've got a shadow that might be yours, and it sounds like you're not fighting the idea so hard." Kyouko leaned closer, trying to sound inviting. "Come on Homura, we don't spawn shadows unless shit's serious, we both know that. You wanna talk about why you might have yours running around? Or maybe just make a plan for killing it?" Homura went back to inspecting her outfit in the mirror with that stony face again, making Kyouko moan in frustration. "Homura, come on here. We both know there's more going on, you and Madoka, you and Sayaka, whatever. I know it, Madoka knows, hell, Mami knows it and she's even more out of the loop than I am. We can fix problems, but only if we know what's going on and where to punch."

"Discussing the shadow's origin is unnecessary. It's in the past, and won't be an issue again. As for plans for fighting it," Homura shrugged. "I had one. But there were complications."

"We're supposed to be cooperating now," Kyouko reminded her. "You said it, not me. It's stupid to ask everyone to totally trust each other right away, I get that, but can you give me a little something to work with?"

"If it is mine, the circumstances don't matter any longer," Homura repeated. "And we can figure out a way to attack the Curse later. Isn't this our day off? If there's not anything else…."

Kyouko leaned back against the door, holding it closed. "Pinkie."

Homura's lips curled upward, eyes sinking half-closed. "Indeed. Madoka."

"So what'd you do to her? She pops off to your place last night, and next thing any of us know her magic's gone, telepathy doesn't work on her, and the big gaping cut in her soul's vanished without a trace. And don't even try denying this one, I remember how you fixed Pinkie when she was having her weird seizures, you're the only one who had any clue what was up with that."

"It's taken care of. She won't attract wraiths, she won't have seizures, and she won't have any other problems now."

"God fu…" Kyouko barely restrained the urge to ruin her hair by running her hands hard across her skull. "Look, I realize there's shit going on I don't know jack about, and I'm trying to keep an open mind here, but yesterday she had magic. Wasn't much, but she had it. Today, she doesn't. With you just stonewalling everything, there's a point where this starts to look a liiiitle bit sinister no matter what angle I hold it at."

Homura leaned closer, unlocking the door with one hand and taking Kyouko's arm with the other. "I told you twice already. It's in the past, and doesn't matter anymore. But you can believe this, if nothing else: Madoka made her choice freely and without compulsion. Now it's done, and there's no use worrying about it." Homura inclined her head toward the exit Kyouko guarded. "The others are waiting. Shall we go?"

Kyouko frowned, but pushed off the door.

OoOoO

Madoka smiled ruefully at the hall Kyouko and Sayaka vanished down. "I think Kyouko ditched us."

"I apologize for her," Mami said, sounding resigned. "Tact has never been her strong point."

"Ehihi, isn't that part of her charm though?"

"I suppose it is."

"So, um… it's a nice park, isn't it? Are you having a good time today, Mami?"

"Certainly, it's been awhile since I've done anything like this. It's nice to see them doing something with this property. The land here used to be an abandoned district from developments before Mitakihara was established, until they cleared it out and built Magicland about a year and a half ago. There are so fewer wraiths now."

"Wraiths? Here?"

"They tend to brood in desolate, abandoned places when they're not out hunting." Mami glanced over, then mentally kicked herself when she realized from Madoka's floundering look that the other girl probably wasn't used to puella magi shop talk coming up at random times. "Ah, sorry, that's hardly a topic for a day off like this, is it? Well, Magicland is a much brighter and happier place now by any measure. Tell me Madoka, how do you know everyone? I heard it mentioned that you grew up with Sayaka, but I hadn't realized before today you knew Nagisa."

"Sayaka and I knew each other forever ago, like you heard. Kyouko I met from Sayaka after they started working together. Homura… um, Homura and I are in the same class at school, and she… um, you could say I caught her eye? And then awhile ago Homura introduced Nagisa to me. What about you?"

"Kyouko and I used to work together, and Sayaka… well, our first proper meeting was through Kyouko. Akemi was always the puella magi watching the next territory over. Nagisa seemed like an inexperienced puella magi when I ran across her recently, so I took it on myself to mentor her a little."

"It seems like all the puella magi know each other because of work," Madoka noted. "I can't decide if that's good or not."

"You seem to know them all yourself. It's certainly better than not knowing anyone friendly. You'll want to trust me on this one." Mami smiled to show she hadn't meant or taken offense.

"You were alone? Um, starting when you and Kyouko stopped working together? It must've been a relief when you met Nagisa then."

"Indeed."

"Nagisa…." Madoka bit at her lip a moment. "She's incredible, isn't she? She's so brave to do something has hard as fighting wraiths at her age. And she's always so happy and earnest, too! I don't think I could keep my spirits up as well as she does if I was in her place."

"Has she done her candy trick for you?" Mami asked.

Madoka lit up. "Where she pulls it out of nowhere? Yes! She's so cute! Takkun loved it too. Oh, Takkun is my little brother Tatsuya, he's three and almost a half. You and Nagisa should come over for dinner with my family sometime and you can meet him."

"I'd like that."

Madoka grew solemn, watching Mami. "I'm glad you're working together now. All of you, I mean. Wraiths are terrifying, and the Great Curse is…" Madoka shivered, remembering the revolting aura of the Curse crawling over her skin even at such a great distance. "A-anyway, none of you should have to fight each other when something like that's around."

"You must want to go back so desperately."

"What do you mean?"

"Back to not knowing about wraiths or puella magi or magic." Mami shifted uncomfortably, troubled by memories. Her own insecurities were something she guarded like a weakening injury in a fight, but everything she'd seen and heard about this girl told her it was safe. "I felt that way for so long after I made my contract, even though I knew my wish saved my life. There were so many days when it was all I could do to get up, breathe calmly, and be about my business. Kyouko and Sayaka mentioned you've come face to face with wraiths, multiple times and once alone. It's lonely, desperate work, but at least I have the magic needed to fight. I can't imagine what it must be like for you to be caught up in this world without even that much."

"But my friends are here. Why would I leave them?"

Mami stared, mouth slightly open, at Madoka's honest confusion; she really meant it. A thought struck Mami."This may well be off the mark, but… Nagisa once told me that she was saved by a girl who wanted puella magi to work together and never give up hope. Until she said that I thought I was the first puella magi she met, but it seems she already knew Sayaka. Last night, the way she and Homura spoke made me think they had a history too. You said Homura introduced Nagisa to you; that was before last night, yes?" Mami waited for Madoka to nod, then continued. "But neither of them quite seems to fit. And just now I realized that I assumed it, but Nagisa never said that girl was puella magi herself. By any chance, were you the girl she meant?"

It didn't seem like the sort of question that required a great deal of thought, but Madoka took her time processing it anyway before she finally answered with an embarrassed smile. "This'll sound even stranger, but I'm not really sure."

Mami cocked her head to the side.

"W-well it might be that way, but I don't remember," Madoka explained. "It's a bit complicated, but you might call it something like a past life? Maybe I can tell you about it sometime when I've sorted everything out in my head." Madoka stopped, frowning. "But wait… that can't be it, because then how would Nagisa remember it?"

It seemed to Mami like Mitakihara was full of nothing but puzzles lately.

"Um, Mami? You're a veteran, right? This probably isn't the best time, but can I ask something about puella magi anyway?"

"Certainly." It didn't seem like Madoka was just changing the subject; she seemed genuinely confused about Mami's question about Nagisa. She didn't see a reason to pursue the topic now.

"It's about curses. Or, maybe it's really about the Great Curse. Everyone told me wraiths are born from curses in human hearts, and those curses are negative emotions, but that seems…" Madoka shrugged. "Too simple? What do you think curses are? Where did that monster over the river come from?"

"It does sound a little trite, doesn't it? Negative emotions, as if all we need is a cup of tea and an hour of calm to make the wraiths vanish away." If that worked, Mami's daily habits during that forsaken solitude would've been more than enough to keep everything at bay. That was manifestly untrue. "People become angry or sad all the time, almost constantly, but it's not as though every poor mark on an exam or bad day at the office is enough to create a wraith. A curse might feed on such things, but surface annoyances like that aren't true curses."

She looked away from Madoka. "A child moves away from all their friends to a new city and, unable to make new friends, comes to believe there isn't a place for them in the world. A salaryman works all day and all night to support his family, then realizes one day his long toil means he barely knows his wife and children anymore. A charitable soul spends so much time looking after people's wounds that she comes to believe ugly wounds are all humanity is made of. Those are the sorts of things that become curses. A curse is when, even unconsciously or only for a few moments, someone's heart fundamentally rejects the world."

"People who feel alone," Madoka realized. "People who don't feel connected to their life."

Mami nodded. "Often, certainly. But the very worst curses aren't from loneliness. The very worst come from those had happiness and love and companionship."

"What? Why?"

"Enmity. One person cursing the world is bad enough, but when two people face each other and feed their curse together in turn…." Mami shook her head. "Only those who are closest to your heart can strike deepest."

"But if you were really friends, you wouldn't hurt each other!"

Mami gave her a look heavy with painful memory. "Do you really believe that?"

Madoka bit her lip and didn't reply. Homura had tried to terrify her. Sayaka's refusal to speak worried Kyouko to no end. Mami and Kyouko looked at each other with relief now, but she'd gathered that they hadn't parted on good terms last time.

"Kyouko and I harbored such a curse for a time," Mami went on. "I don't know if she mentioned it, but some time ago her life was… in disarray. Neither of us dealt with it well. We turned on each other and fought, then went our separate ways. Imagine two great wraiths called shadows, empowered by the magic from a puella magi's soul, clashing over and over. A burning horsewoman and a tea party host. The picture sounds silly, doesn't it? But fighting both shadows at once and coming out on top may be the moment I truly earned the right to call myself a veteran. Kyouko and I spent months hunting down the shadows slipping from our souls. Separately, of course; only our shadows were clever enough to seek each other out."

Madoka wrung her hands, but made herself meet Mami's eyes. "Thank you for telling me something so personal. We haven't known each other very long, but hearing about curses from you helped. Thank you."

Mami smiled. "It's easier to talk about now that Kyouko and I have sorted ourselves out. Don't give it a second thought."

They drifted onto lighter topics after that, but before long Nagisa half-ran, half-pranced back into the room with Sayaka in tow. She dashed over and spun in front of Madoka and Mami's seats, showing off her pale lavender dress with sashes of slightly darker cloth running in layers around the poofy skirt. "Lookit, lookit, I'm done!"

"It's cute!" Madoka said.

"You look wonderful!" Mami agreed. "Now, did you remember to thank Sayaka for helping you?"

"Uh huh! Sayaka's so nice, she can be my other big sister!"

Sayaka rubbed a hand behind her head. "It is a cute dress, but… it kind of makes her look like a cake, too. The sashes are basically frosting."

Madoka sighed. "Sayaka…"

"But that's why I picked it!" Nagisa declared, and pulled a butterscotch drop out of nowhere to toss to Sayaka. "Because I'm the puella magi of sweets!"

"I somehow expected that," Mami said, covering her mouth to quiet a laugh.

OoOoO

"For behold and stuff, I have stormed the palace and captured the fair maiden!" shouted Kyouko the Vile, standing triumphant atop the back of the throne and hefting one of Mami's rifled muskets above her. "She is mine, and none of you can have her!"

"Qualify that," Lady Sayaka called from the floor, where she had been slain in dishonorable combat when Kyouko the Vile shot her in the back. "We're basically rolling in fair maidens here."

"I have captured the pink maiden, for she's got more pink than all you together!"

"Alas, I am captured." Maid Madoka languished on the seat of the throne, flopping sideways so her head drooped over one armrest in bleak hopeless despair as she bemoaned her evil fate and her ruffly dress spilled over the other side. "Who can save me now that my faithful knight is fallen?"

"Hold that pose a moment," Mami said as she fiddled with the controls. "Kyouko, would you swing your rifle a little more toward the camera on your upper right? Yes, that's wonderful. And… okay, keep going."

"I will save the pink maiden," declared the mighty hero as she rushed forward waving around a brace of pistols. "No villain unpunished, no girl left alone, no cheese uneaten! Have no fear, the masked Bebe is here!"

"Oh really?" asked Kyouko the Vile, leveling her musket at the hero from her chair-based sniper's tower. "I see no mask, fool."

"Of course! Not having a mask is my mask! I only hide my face when I'm not being a superhero." Nagisa nodded sagely. "Now come down and fight me!"

"Your funeral, kid." Kyouko the Vile hopped down and swung her musket like a club, sending Nagisa ducking beneath the mighty yet slow blow. "You gettin' these, Mami?"

"Yes, just keep going!"

Nagisa blocked a gentle downward swing by crossing her pistols and catching it on the stocks, then struggled mightily to hold back the gun turned impromptu bashy stick. "Your evil ways will come to naught, Vile One! 'Cause I know something you don't know!"

Kyouko sniggered. "Lemme guess, you're not left handed?"

"Close! The truth is, I'm only the distraction!"

"Tickles for Kyouko!" Madoka shouted as she pounced.

"H-hey, what are you! Gah, hey, Pinkie, let off!" Kyouko dropped the rifle—it disappeared into ribbons halfway to the ground—and tried spinning about. But then Nagisa struck from behind, and the whole melee went to the ground, where Madoka and Nagisa's attack reduced Kyouko to helpless laughter while Sayaka suddenly returned from the dead and joined the fray.

"And they were such nice dresses," Mami mourned, continuing to work the camera anyway.

Perfect Portraiture had photo booths available, but that wasn't the main draw. It also had fully-built sets right out of fairy tales that a group could pose on, complete with a deep stash of props. Cameras mounted around the room, along with camera controls built into the set at inconspicuous locations, covered all the best angles, and a park attendant with a digital camera was available if needed for other shots. The girls had signed up for a palace ballroom and throne room set, then went about staging swashbuckling adventures across the dance floor, broken up by occasional shots of actual dancing.

The brawl wound down, and Madoka tried to catch her breath as she pulled herself up. "You can jump in anytime, you know!"

"I'm fine," Homura said, voice jumping up pitch. She hung back off the set beside Mami, and had done the same with every improv scene. "I'll just watch until you want a posed photo or a dance."

"Booooring," Kyouko called.

"Well I want one now, then! One with just you and me. Come sit next me." Furniture props were scattered around the room, so Madoka found a plush bench and dragged it over to a wall painted like a window. The scene looked out over an enchanted lunar garden, with Earth a ball hanging in the starlit sky.

"Straighten her up a little, would you Homura?" Mami asked.

The tickling match had done a number on Madoka's dress and hair, but she happily stood still while Homura re-tied her ribbons and helped straighten her dress. "Are you having fun, Homura?" she asked.

"Yes, I am. It's just a bit overwhelming, that's all."

"It's been a long time since you played like this wasn't it? It's been a long time since you took those photos of everyone you keep in your apartment." Homura nodded, and Madoka beamed. "Well, today I want to make sure you get some new photos of everyone to add to the others! Ones with you in them, too."

Homura finished the ribbons, hands drifting to a slow stop while Madoka and Homura were still close. She worked her lips for a moment, uncertain what to say. "I… thank you. Thank you."

Madoka smiled, then tugged Homura onto the bench. "Mami, can you take a bunch of shots really fast?"

"If you want me to," Mami answered.

"Yes, please!"

The first photo captured Madoka and Homura perfectly posed, smiling for the camera. They were a study in contrasts. Madoka shone with enthusiasm and energy, Homura was placid and quiet. Madoka's light pink sleeveless dress, essentially a sundress with extra layers of ruffles added down the skirt, underscored her innocent warmth, while Homura's almost more austere dress with its deep purple and silvered lines made her seem like a remnant of an older era finally emerging blinking into the light. Even their hair carried out the image. For Homura, Mami had taken off the headband and woven a pair of black ribbons through her hair, letting the ends dangle. How they stayed was anyone's guess (magic), but the effect was faintly gothic in her already dark ensemble next to Madoka's bouncy pink pigtails.

Yet despite the contrast, they meshed well. One was excited and the other calm, but they were both happy. They had nearly the same smile, and their hands clasped on the bench between them.

The second photo captured the moment Madoka's angelic face snuck a look of mischief at Homura. The third photo, the instant Madoka sprung at Homura to throw arms around her neck and plant a kiss on her cheek. Homura's bulging eyes and desperate attempt to jump out of her skin was the subject of photo number four, but somewhere around photo number seven she calmed down and, lightening her color scheme by going quite pink in the face, wrapped her arms around Madoka and let her girlfriend press their heads together.

Photo number _nine_ , now, was the moment when the flying edge of blue hair entered the frame. Sayaka's face, pulled taut with the strain of focusing on the most important of all possible missions, joined her hair in the next shot. Her ballistic nature became apparent in photo eleven as it showed that yes, she was travelling nearly parallel to the ground. Photo twelve would have benefited from some way to record sound as well as image, because the screams were as essential to capturing the scene as the flurry of blue cloth completely filling the view.

Photo thirteen, nothing but an empty bench.

"Keep the kissy face to a minimum!" Sayaka shouted at the other two pinned beneath her.

"What? Sayaka? That's why you tackled us?" Madoka whined. "It was a peck on the cheek!"

Homura would have glowered at everything in view while she was stuck beneath two bodies, but everything in view was a mass of pink cloth.

"Yeah, well coming from you two it's pissing me off anyway."

"So which of 'em are you jealous of?" Kyouko asked from the shelves of props, hefting a crossbow. "Homura for snagging your childhood crush, or Madoka for scoring this hottie?"

"What? No!" Sayaka, in the middle of climbing off the pile, nearly fell over again. "It's not like that! I'm—"

"Real easy to wind up, dumbass." Kyouko shoved the crossbow back onto its shelf. "Lay off 'em. Why don't you come take a photo with me?"

In a display of her usual grim resolve, Sayaka stuck her tongue out at Kyouko while offering Madoka a hand up—until Madoka was yanked back down from her grasp.

"Homur—" Madoka tried to say, then suddenly lost all interest in talking.

Mami laughed lightly. "It seems like brinkmanship is a poor strategy with Akemi. Take note, Sayaka."

"Ha! Mami, are you getting pictures of this?" Kyouko crowed.

"No! No, I'm certainly not!"

"Okay, point made, you two," Sayaka said, scowling. "You can let up now."

"This is your fault," Kyouko told her. "This is… uh… huh."

"Oh my," Mami muttered, suddenly wondering where Nagisa had got to and hoping she hadn't noticed this.

Taking a gasp of air, Madoka shot up with a smile threatening to sear itself onto her face permanently, before dissolving into uncontrollable giggles. Homura had enough grace to not shoot a smug look at Sayaka from the floor, but that may have been because she'd forgotten what set this off in the first place.

"Hey, look what I found!" Nagisa came around the other side of the prop shelves, holding up two slender ceremonial swords. Their basket hilts, painted vital red, bore the image of roses in full bloom. Thorn designs ran up the length of the blade. The swords were right out of a shoujo fantasy manga, designed to wed strength and softness, love and danger, resolve and sincerity.

Everyone stopped to appreciate the design. "If ever there was symbol for puella magi…" Mami said, eying them appreciatively.

"There's a whole set of them back here!" Nagisa said.

Everyone passed looks around the group. "You all thinking what I'm thinking?" Kyouko asked.

The last photo of the session at Perfect Portraiture was a group shot. They stood in the middle of the dance floor, lined up side to side with each other and facing the camera. Kyouko and Sayaka took the middle, turned slightly toward one another; Madoka was on Sayaka's left, then Homura on Madoka's other side. Mami took Kyouko's other side, then Nagisa on the end.

Swords and ball gowns. It was about as fitting an image as any of them could come up with for their little band. They held the swords up at attention with their right hands, and set their left on the shoulder of the girl next to them, for that was who they were at their very best: never leaving each other alone, always ready to fight and ready to love.

OoOoO

Aida Tarou, Magicland games attendant, went on explaining the gear required for Grimm Gallery to the six girls, who looked like a bunch of middle schoolers along with one of their kid sisters. They paid close attention; even the youngest girl, the one with white hair, followed along with a sweet little smile on her face while he explained the hit detection vest, made to look like chain mail, and the laser tag crossbow that went with it. They got girls in here at the Gallery all the time, of course, but it was a little unusual to have a group made up _entirely_ of girls. But they seemed interested though, so whatever floats their zeppelin, right? It's not like the Gallery was just for the crazy paintballers who came here to practice their teamwork and owned the scoreboard. Besides, he got paid the same either way.

"Um, what straps go where?" the youngest asked, fumbling about with the vest and vainly trying to reach the panel on her back.

The motherly, gold-haired girl who seemed to be the oldest moved over to her before anyone else could. "One of your straps is caught," she said as she tugged the wayward strap out from between the vest and her back. "There you go, let's try again now."

"Thank you, Mami!"

Two of the other girls, faster to get their gear in order and clearly too bouncy for sitting around waiting, were striking poses with their crossbows. "Watch out world, Double-Oh-Miki's on the hunt!"

The shrewd-looking one with the red ponytail took advantage of her friend's heroic sky-reaching pose to jam the crossbow against her back. "Bam! Gotcha again. Stop letting me shoot you in the back!"

Sayaka took a good-natured swipe at her friend. "Gah! Is nothing sacred to you? Just let me pose, will you?"

"Um, please don't run in the gear," Tarou tried as they started chasing each other. He didn't think they heard him though, what with the way their pink-haired friend was laughing along with delight. Whatever. They'd probably run him over if he tried getting in the middle of that.

"Um," went the oldest girl as she tugged at her own vest on. "Oh dear. I… might need a larger one."

Huh. That… was a problem. "We can try it," Tarou said, "The next size up will be, ah, wider, but it'll probably be too long to fit comfortably. Different problem, I guess?"

The quiet, dark girl of the group saved the day from inadequately sized vests by moving forward and fiddling with her friend's vest. When she moved away, the space between the front and back vests had been extended by adding a few small climbing carabiners to where the straps were supposed to click together.

"Ah. Thank you, Akemi. That's much better!" the eldest warmly thanked her.

…wait, why did she just have a set of carabiners on hand? _Where_ did she have a set of carabiners?

Whatever, it worked out. With everyone's gear equipped, he walked them through activating and using it and took their call signs for the scoreboard. Not that he expected a lot there. Again, paintball people and other sports teams came through here all the time, they were going to do better than a bunch of middle schoolers any day of the week. The group went with their hair colors for call signs; the oldest wanted hers in Italian for some reason. Not like that was the weirdest thing Tarou had to spell for the Grimm Gallery, though. Last week he had a group of Tolkien nerds in here; after the third name in Elvish he just handed them a paper and made them write their names down themselves.

After that was squared away, he explained the rules. Grimm Gallery was a team game that used the holographic technologies common throughout Mitakihara to project monsters that would attack them. The players needed to reach the end of the course in one piece, while using cover to evade attacks and gunning down the multitude of werewolves, hags, ghosts, devils, malicious fairies, and worse coming after them. Players couldn't be hit while in cover unless they let themselves get flanked, but couldn't shoot back either. Since monsters could only threaten one area of the course at a time, they would need to cover one another and rely on team communication to know when it was time to duck or come up for a shot. A player whose health was depleted couldn't fire, but could still act as a lookout for the others. They would be scored based on time to completion, kills, and health remaining at the end.

All that was left to start the course and send them in. He went through a side door back to the control booth where he could watch the whole course, complete with sound, and started their entry countdown. The girls hung around the entrance in a loose knot, watching the old-fashioned countdown timer tick lower.

A holographic grim reaper appeared floating by the two trees that marked the entrance. "Prepare thyself to enter the Deep Forest," went his canned lines and flapping jawbone, ever-so-slightly tinny audio coming from the speakers around the room, "And seek thy most deserved death!"

Eyes sinking half-closed, the eldest girl regarded the entrance with a steely air that somehow lurked beneath the warm smile she'd sported this entire time. "Akemi on point, I believe," she told the others. "Then a wedge formation. Madoka and Nagisa on the middle row, then Sayaka and Kyouko in back. I'll take the center. Let's take this at a jog, shall we?"

The counter hit zero. As one, they dashed forward and fell into formation like a crossbow bolt punching through armor.

Over the next several minutes, Aida Tarou's eyes peeled back until they were threatening his forehead's territory. All he could do was sit back and reflect that _this was not what he expected._

"The guardian of the path awaits thee, foolish travelers, and his blade thirsts for—"

"Armored ogre trying to block our front! Front ranks, focus fire! Sayaka, Kyouko, stay on the flanks!"

"Goblins sneaking up the left flank, but I can get 'em!"

"Ogre down! Advance!"

"Here in the forest forsaken of the light, the souls of the fallen shall find thee and—"

"Eyes up, ghosts approaching high using forest canopy as cover. Wide arc. Reloading, cover me."

Tarou tapped the display where it showed their health meters, which refused to go down despite their ceaseless advance. He asked the computer to do a check, and yes, their hit detection vests were in fact functioning, thank you very much. They just weren't bothering to use cover. At all.

"Restless souls would keep to the grave, but for their tormenter. Art thou prepared to face the necro—"

"Crone dashing between cover on the right, already took three shots. Boss character HP."

"Okay! Akemi, focus on its center, everyone else, take her sides to catch the crone mid-dash. Don't let it move freely, now!"

"Die motherfucker!" screamed the fanged one between cackling laughter as she got the killshot on the necromancer crone. "Die, and burn in hell!"

"Thy courage has carried thee far, travelers, but now they end is come. No wanderer has passed the ravenous fangs of the immortal cursed knight of Selene!"

A chilling howl went up from the dark forest, answered by first one then another, until the whole room echoed with their cries. It was impossible to tell where the first attack would come from. Hunched shadows of werewolves slunk through the darkness, coming steadily closer on stalking paws, and within their ranks there rode a form encased in twisted armor. Hot, angry breath misted from his faceguard, and golden canine eyes gleamed from the depths of the black steel; he raised a cruel halberd and let loose a blood-curdling howl, then fell backward off his mount as a perfect shot punched right through to his eyes, skipping the armor and its enormous HP entirely.

"I got the doggy knight!" the short one in pigtails happily called out as she reloaded. And she looked so soft and pink before…. She still did! How did she look so adorable while cutting down her foes?

Their leader down and their first three ranks melting under sustained fire, the werewolves fled with their tails between their legs. Tarou didn't even know the monsters _could_ retreat, and certainly not while crying!

The kill team came to the largest room in the course, a clearing scattered with jutting rocks in a wide arc for cover and a large empty space in front of a cave entrance at the other end. The forest canopy gave way to the actual ceiling, painted and lit to look like the night sky. The Grim Reaper appeared once again, drifting menacingly. "Your path has been bought by precious blood," the reaper's voice echoed around the room. Tarou glanced at their health meters. Still full. "But have you enough to quench this beast's thirst?"

The sound of wings came over every speaker, flooding the room, then the stars were blotted out by the bulk of the descending dragon illuminated by gouts of flame from its maw.

"Spread out wide and take cover," the blond one shouted, already moving herself.

Aaaand yes, they managed to shoot the dragon in the face a few times before it even finished landing. They didn't even freeze up for a few seconds when the dragon came down. _Everyone_ froze up first time they see the dragon. It was a rule or something! It doesn't matter if it's holographic, it's a giant monster! Didn't they have any sense of fear?

"Wheee!" shouted the little kid, as she popped up from cover to take a shot after the stream of flame passed.

No. No, they did not.

End result: One dragon end boss, hitting the ground with a thunderous crash from the speakers before dissolving into sparkling light. Six girls, strolling into the cave and out the exit. Six new names atop the high score chart, with a new record completion time.

"THAT WAS TOTALLY AWESOME!" Tarou exploded at them in gear room after they came out looking like they were on a Sunday stroll.

"Our hundred years of training served us well," the pink one said, pressing her hands together like a monk.

"How? How did you do that? I've never seen anything like it!"

"Well it's not like we'd rather suck at it," the blue one said. She was carrying the murderous one with the fang around like a princess, and wasn't straining at all.

"Surely that sort of performance isn't that unusual," their blond commander demurely reasoned. "Not if a few random middle school students can do it on their first try."

"No one does that! The last group to even come close was a bunch of military guys, and they took three times as long because they actually _stopped to use cover like you're supposed to_! What kind of team are you? Paintball? Archery? Basketball? Soccer?"

The wiry one with the fang smacked her friend's arm and nodded, the universal signal for "drive me closer!" After the blue-haired girl obliged, Tarou found a mischievous grin filling his vision as the fanged girl leaned up way too close.

"Actually, none of the above. We're a magical girl team.," she said. She raised one hand and, with a burst of light, a jeweled silver and black ring burst from off her finger and reformed into a gem encased in gold; it shone with brilliant red light. "And the best part is? _No one will ever believe you._ "

"Ha ha ha, that's..." Tarou looked around for the cameras. "That's... what? I... I mean..."

"I think you broke him," Mami said with some worry as they started undoing their gear.

"You're not supposed to say that, are you?" Nagisa asked.

"Why? 'slike I said, no one's gonna believe him." Kyouko jumped out of Sayaka's and the two of them rushed to catch up with the others. The girls filed out of the room, leaving the games attendant muttering to himself and staring into corners of the ceiling. "Anyway, let's jet before he snaps out of it. Who's up for pizza?"

OoOoO

After the Grimm Gallery, they starting hitting rides. Everyone had their own list they wanted to go on and every ride had its own line, so they started splitting off into groups and meeting up again after. Kyouko and Sayaka in particular were only interested in the rides built around the idea of gratuitous drops and murderous speed, and so went dashing off together arm in arm to find the most suicidal offerings in the park.

The other four stayed together a bit longer, checking out some of the rides that were only middling lethal, like the Snow Queen's Sleigh and the Grave of the Moon. Mami and Nagisa split off after that to hunt down some ice cream, leaving Madoka and Homura alone.

They settled on riding a Ferris wheel together. The park had other rides that went for speed or height, so rather than get a Ferris wheel that went as high as it could or had a huge frame with massive cars, Magicland's Ferris wheel was a slow little thing with tiny cabins suitable for just two at a time. Every cabin was a fashioned into a pumpkin carriage with bronze casing running on its outside and red cushions inside.

The wheel shifted as they began moving. Madoka looked at Homura, sitting across from her, and smiled. "Hey Homura, what're you looking at?"

Homura had her phone out while they were in line, and still kept swiping through screens as they started moving. She turned the phone so Madoka could see. Glossy hard copies of pictures they wanted from Perfect Portraiture would take a few days to arrive, but they were able to get electronic copies loaded right away, and Homura had the group photo of everyone posing side by side with swords pulled up. "I never thought we'd do this again," Homura said quietly.

"Have fun with everyone like this again?"

"Or even be friends again." Homura turned to look out the window, brow faintly creased. From Homura in her uncertain reticent mode, that was as good as nearly crying from any other person. "Nagisa I only met recently, but everyone else... Madoka. Of everyone you know, your family and friends and classmates and teachers, how many of them have been with you since the beginning?"

"Um, Mama and Papa and Sayaka. Even Hitomi and Kyousuke I didn't meet until a little later."

"Indeed. Everyone else comes and goes, don't they? They fade in and out of your life to be forgotten, but those three you remember as far back as you are capable of remembering, and those three have been caught up in nearly everything you do. I have such people as well. You. Sayaka, Kyouko, Mami."

Madoka reached out and caught one of Homura's hands, rubbing it with her thumb while she smiled encouragingly. "How long?"

"I'm... not certain. I think I was looping longer than I lived before I became puella magi." If she noticed the way Madoka's breath caught at that, she didn't give any sign. She was still staring out the window with haunted eyes, focusing on the difficult task of forcing out these words that didn't want to come after so long of bottling them up. "You've always been there, all four of you, almost as long as I can remember. Caught up in everything I do, everything important to me. The only people who mattered. My friends."

"But things got worse?" Madoka pressed softly.

"The center couldn't hold, and things fell apart." Homura swallowed. "You were still right there in front of me every time, but we weren't friends anymore. Sayaka stopped trying to look out for me. Mami saw me as an opponent. Kyouko thought I was too dangerous to go near. You... you were afraid to go near me."

Homura lifted the phone again, where they and their friends still stood shoulder to shoulder. "I never expected this to happen again."

"But you still seem scared somehow."

"Scared?" Homura tilted her head, flicking her eyes back to Madoka for a moment. "Am I?"

"Overwhelmed, maybe?"

"I feel..." Homura paused. "Younger. I feel younger. When I didn't know what I needed to do and what was happening. If... if I'd won this victory with my own hands, I would know what to do with it. If we were together because I succeeded, I would seize it. But I had just realized and accepted that even in this world, where everyone was alive and happy, I would still be apart, and then... you came back to me. I can't have this, can I? I'm not supposed to." Homura, beginning to tremble, squeezed Madoka's hand like it was about to be torn away from her at any second.

Madoka carefully stood up and switched sides, sliding alongside Homura on the bench. She took Homura's phone away and slid it back into her pocket, then took Homura's other hand in hers too. "I don't know if we'll stay safe forever, but it won't be because you're not allowed to be happy. I'm here, I'm safe. All you have to do is hold on and do your best. Let me take care of everything else, okay?"

Homura could feel her composure falling to pieces. Madoka let go of her hand long enough to grab a handkerchief out of her purse and draw Homura's head closer.

Akemi Homura lost track of the tears she'd cried over her life. She used to weep freely and constantly when she was young enough to wear braids. When she grew hardened by her trials, she still found more than enough to cry over, though rarely in front of the others. She cried from the loneliness when Madoka made her mighty wish that wiped away wishes and gave hope back to puella magi across all time, for Madoka herself was gone. She cried again now, but it was different than most of the others. Homura wasn't used to crying from joy so strong she thought her heart would burst.

OoOoO

Eventually Sunday afternoon turned to evening, evening turned to sunset. Everybody met up for one last ride, a river tunnel on a swan boat just big enough to get six passengers with a cozy fit, and then it was time to head back out to the world outside. They hung about the entrance plaza, idly chatting and laughing as they took their time saying their goodbyes now.

Sayaka turned when she felt Madoka tug at her sleeve, drawing her away from the others a few steps. "What's up?" Sayaka asked.

"Are you okay?" Madoka asked, leaning up toward her.

"Of course, I had a blast today!" Sayaka laughed, spinning on her heels and adding an extra step of space between them.

"I mean about, um, Homura and everything."

"Of course. Why wouldn't I be?"

Madoka stared through Sayaka's cocky grin, biting at her lip. "Sayaka? You know you can tell me anything, right? Anything at all, no matter what it is?"

Sayaka clapped a hand on Madoka's shoulder, nudging her back to the others. "Right, of course."

Kyouko elbowed Sayaka as soon as she was in range and nodded. "Mami 'n Twintails are setting up a meeting so we can talk about puella magi shit, sooner rather than later. Probably tomorrow."

Mami and Akemi were off in their own world, with Nagisa hanging about behind them listening in. That was sort of the point of today according to Madoka, wasn't it? Get Akemi in with the group? From here on out, Sayaka would have to deal with having her around on their wraith hunts and while they figured out what to do about the Great Curse.

It would probably be useful. Her power, anyway. One more strong puella magi. Strong as the devil. Forget about that killer arrow storm; even with just Akemi's timestop, they could clear every wraith in the city in a single night.

And yet. Now Madoka was hanging nearby with Nagisa, listening in on Mami and Akemi with the happiest relieved smile on her face. It shouldn't be like this.

"Let's jet," Sayaka muttered, slipping her arm around Kyouko's and walking off.

"Eh? You sure?"

"Yeah. They can tell us the time at school tomorrow, or during patrols tonight."

Madoka was on the ball enough to catch them leaving, and after a slight hesitation waved goodbye and let them go.

There was the bus, or they could go roofjumping, but for now Sayaka ignored both options and just walked. She wasn't much one for rose-sniffing, but she found herself staring at the ember light cast over the city from sunset; the orange glow seemed the perfect fit for her right now. The day was long, the day had done its best. The day was dying nonetheless. She still had her arm wrapped around Kyouko's, and felt her partner shifting restlessly at her side as they walked.

It would be so easy. It would be so easy to stop fighting. She was the only one still struggling. Nagisa couldn't do a thing. Madoka… had made her choice, it seemed. No one else knew enough to realize they should be struggling. She tucked her head against Kyouko's shoulder, feeling her jump a tiny bit. It would be so easy.

"H-hey Sayaka? Not that I'm complaining or nothing, but today you've been, you know, eh, really…"

"Crazy? Unstable?" Sayaka veered her step, almost pushing her friend over.

Kyouko regained her footing and glared at the girl latched on her arm. "Touchy."

"It's not like we ever shy about dragging each other around before."

"Yeah, but more 'n usual today. N-not that I'm complaining!"

She didn't say anything back, just tightened her grip.

Kyouko nudged her way off the sidewalk, bringing Sayaka with her, and stopped just into a side street. She pulled Sayaka off her and held her in front of her by the shoulders. Kyouko was going red in the face and looked like she was screwing up her courage for something important.

Sayaka felt her heart strain within her. It would be easy. It would be so, so easy.

"Hey, so, I've been thinking today," Kyouko started. "I mean, I've been thinking awhile, but really today while we were doing…" She waved back vaguely toward Magicland, "All that fun stuff. Together, I mean."

"Kyouko…."

"Just, just let me finish, okay? You saved me, Sayaka. I was at rock bottom, and you came along when I was finally ready to grab someone's hand. I'd do the same for you. Hell, I already do, don't I? I know you rely on me."

"You keep me sane," Sayaka admitted, throat clenching. "As much as anyone can."

"We work together great, you and me. We got each other's backs. We saved each other's lives, more than once." Kyouko nodded, reassuring herself. "But that's not all. That's great on its own, that's enough to mean something real. But we can still be more, can't we?"

"Stop. Kyouko, stop. I can't. I… I can't be this for you right now. I'm sorry."

Kyouko stopped short, surprise and disappointment plain on her face. "I thought… I was sure that… fine. Whatever, fine. Sorry for reading too much into it, I guess."

Kyouko let go of Sayaka's shoulders and began to step away, but Sayaka caught her hands. What was she doing? It would be better to just let Kyouko think what she did. If Kyouko believed she was just Sayaka's rescue project or that taking her in was just her good deed for the month, wouldn't that make it so much easier for Sayaka to do what she needed to? But that wouldn't be right either, wouldn't be honest or just. "That's not it. That's not it at all," Sayaka told her. "There's no one I'd rather have at my side watching my back. And…" Sayaka laughed, hating the way her heart was pulling her in different directions. "I think it's my nature to fall in love. I'm the kind of person who needs to find someone I can trust with my heart. And you, you're definitely that, Kyouko."

"Then why?"

"I'm keeping secrets, aren't I? I'm doing stupid things, aren't I? And I'm not going to stop. Do you really want to get tangled up with someone you can' trust?"

Kyouko swallowed. "Too late. We're already spaghetti. I told you I'd stare down the apocalypse with you, didn't I? Tell me. Whatever it is, just tell me."

Sayaka shook her head. "I can't, I can't bring you in on this, and I can't stop. Whatever's left for me to do, I can only do it alone." She finally let go of Kyouko's hands and stepped back. "I think… I think I need some air. See you tonight for patrolling?"

"Yeah." Kyouko looked like she'd been kicked and wanted to be angry, but just couldn't work herself up to it. Sayaka checked around to be sure no one was looking down their way, then tensed to jump for the roofs. "Hey," Kyouko said. "I'm happier than I've been in a long time. I blame you for that. This life I've got now is so happy because I've got you. If you can't worry about yourself, then think about that, okay Blue?"

Sayaka jumped.

OoOoO

Homura frowned as she walked across the floor of coalesced miasma, what shifting liveliness it had sapped away by the stillness of her timestop. She hadn't thought to enter the Great Curse again, and she still didn't dare get close to its heart, but now she had reason to come to its outer edges. Usotsuki tugged at her arm, trying to make her walk faster. It shouldn't particularly matter with time stopped like this, but she pushed her pace anyway until she and her doll reached their destination.

Sayaka sat on the ground, frozen with her hands wiping vainly at her eyes. She was still in her street clothes.

A memory struck Homura: Tossing a grief seed across the ground before a kneeling girl. _"I won't let Madoka go through the pain of seeing you tear yourself apart, Miki Sayaka. Take the seed."_ Homura clenched her fists. She had come too far, lost too much, and now she had no more chances. She would not lose anything else this time.

"Go," she told her familiar. "I'll deal with her."

Usotsuki shifted back into Homura's soul, where she'd be out of the way; Homura snapped her shield shut. Sayaka noticed her as soon as time started, recoiling with sudden fury twisting her face through the tears.

"You! Can't you leave me alone?"

Instead of facing Sayaka and looking at that accusing anger, Homura stood examining the distant city of miasma that made up the Curse's deeper lair. "If you insist on leaving your friends, no. Someone must be sure you do nothing foolish."

"Foolish? You think I'm going to do something stupid? You think I'm going to get myself killed?" Sayaka's laugh held an edge of hysteria; disbelief wracked her voice. "How could I? What can I do, Akemi? What's left for me to do?"

"You're distraught. Show me your soul gem."

For a second she was sure Sayaka was about to jump up and hit her, and she wouldn't blame her for it. Sayaka didn't attack, but also wrapped her right hand around her soul gem ring, hiding it from sight. "I'm not going after the Great Curse," she all but spat. "Not on my own, not like this. That's what you want to hear, isn't it? Going in there and getting myself killed is the only thing left. It's the only way to do _something_ , but I can't. I'm an idiot for not going, but I can't do that to Kyouko." A sob broke loose from her throat at Kyouko's name; she fought to get her voice under control. "I can't… I can't keep doing this to her. Is that why you put us together in this world, Akemi? Is this the trap you laid for me? You know who I am, you know my nature! Is this what you wanted from Kyouko?"

"I only cleared the way between you; you two drew together yourself. I did it because I wanted you to have a chance at paradise in my world, not to trap you. Is this world so bad, Miki? Is the thought of happiness so horrifying?"

"How do I know?!" Sayaka surged to her feet and grabbed Homura by the collar, lifting her off the ground and screaming in her face; Homura stayed slack and didn't struggle. "You keep saying your world is better, but how do I know? How do I judge? I can't remember because you tore my head apart! Maybe you had good reasons for doing this! Maybe you saved us all! But how do I know if you _won't let me_?"

"Sayaka!" Homura shouted. " _Show me your gem_."

She trembled like a wounded animal caught between fight and flight, but after a second Sayaka set Homura back on the ground and manifested her soul gem. Deep murky darkness roiled up from its heart; Homura grabbed a whole fistful of grief cubes from her shield and pressed them to the gem.

"The first thing I remember is being so mad at you," Sayaka said as her gem cleared, quietly as though all her fury was spent. "Mad enough to wage a war until the end of time. All I can do is cling to that anger, because that's all I can trust. But thinking about it now, and what I've put together… I don't think I hated you. I hate Kyubey, I hate the wraiths. But you were one of us, weren't you, devil? How could Madoka give herself to you so willingly if you weren't? Even now, you act so cold but you're worried about me. Please, Akemi. I can't forgive you if I don't understand. Please, let me remember."

She'd already considered giving Sayaka a glimpse or two of the past world, if only to give some context to ease the strain and confusion Sayaka bore up under. But then… then Madoka upset all her plans and expectations by accepting her. Sayaka would never be able to countenance the sins Homura committed to build this world; she would never let Madoka remain here, half-asleep and bound.

"You would use those memories to fight against me," Homura said. "I won't risk that."

Homura could feel Sayaka trembling again where their arms tangled together, before the other girl staggered away, still clutching her soul gem in one hand.

Homura took a step forward, but faltered. "I'm sorry."

A sapphire light burned in Sayaka's eyes. "You have every reason to believe in your own cause," she said. Her fist clenched her gem; even with its light cleansed, a tiny core of frothing darkness remained in its depths. The air about Sayaka shuddered with heaviness and flickered with darkness. "And even then, you can't believe in it enough to think I might forgive you if I knew. Fine."

In a flash, Homura understood her mistake, understood how shadows were born. Witches could not be born without flooding the gem with darkness and shattering its shell. But in this world where grief drained from gems continuously, it didn't matter how much corruption was in the gem at any one moment as long as the girl harbored a strong enough curse in her heart. The way was already open.

Sayaka took a rattling breath. "Then I can't ever accept your world."

Homura's senses screamed at her from the malice roiling in front of her. "You're raising a curse, Sayaka! It's building too fast! Calm down, or it—"

The shockwave nearly knocked her to the ground. Homura planted her feet in the miasma and flared her magic into her shield, sending up a faint corona of purple light that held firm against the abyssal pressure coming from the gem. Agonized groans tore their way out of Sayaka. Her unsteady, wavering feet didn't even look like they were holding her; she dangled as though her grip on her soul gem was the only thing keeping her up. The roiling darkness in her gem stretched, pulsed, pushed at the edges of the jewel like a living thing. It detached from the center, floating freely, swimming upward through the blue light and past the brass-like arms of the casing.

"Get out," Sayaka half-shouted, half-begged, wracked by pain that couldn't simply be shut off. "Get out of my head!"

Homura didn't know what to do. Old instincts from a past life were screaming at her to cleanse the gem or shoot it out before a witch was born, but this wasn't a witch. Sayaka would survive the shadow emerging, and cleansing wouldn't stop it. Nothing she could do would stop it. She could only stand by and watch.

One last scream tore its way from Sayaka's throat, one last wave of power, one last push. The core of darkness squeezed from her gem, rising in the air above her and gathering itself. Murky blue light sprung from its center and crept out to form the latticework pattern that marked the portal to the labyrinth of a mature shadow. Homura snapped an assault rifle out of her shield and sent a stream of full-auto hot lead at the shadow; the bullets vanished into the portal with barely a ripple. Homura frowned. They would have to fight inside its labyrinth to have any effect.

Sayaka caught herself on her knee, panting hard. "What… what was that?" She looked up, and locked eyes on the shadow above her. Her eyes dilated, her jaw locked into a snarl, and her hands trembled like they were reaching for a sword; Homura could almost watch all thought and reason flee from her face. Flickers of pain and loss flitted across her expression almost faster than Homura could recognize them. Sayaka was almost certainly caught up in a whirlwind of half-dead memories she had no way of processing or understanding.

Rather than stay or attack them, the shadow began flying deeper toward the Great Curse's center. Whether it was drawn to the Curse, or baiting them, or simply had no interest in them, Homura couldn't tell; the shadow's glittering lattice didn't communicate much.

"Sayaka! Wait! Let it go, you're in no shape to fight it!"

If it was bait, it was working; Sayaka was already dashing after the fast-retreating shadow, screaming wordlessly. Usotsuki jumped out from Homura's soul. "What do we do, Good-For-Nothing?"

Sayaka caught up with the shadow and leapt through its portal, vanishing instantly. Homura flicked her eyes toward the distant miasma-city; she could feel the shadow of the Great Curse. It knew she was here. It was waiting for her to slip up again. She couldn't go near it, or there wouldn't be any escape this time. Sayaka was a little too occupied to save her life again, after all.

"Good-For-Nothing? Mistress, please!" Usotsuki begged, pulling at her arm.

"Go! Go after her!"

Usotsuki was gone as soon as Homura finished the first word, all but flying over the misty ground. Homura took a deep breath, watching as her familiar chased the shadow down and leapt through the portal after Sayaka. She had to think. She couldn't risk going closer to the Curse herself, and her Clara dolls save Usotsuki were scattered across the city. She could pull up as many minor familiars as she needed, but the crow Liese would be the only ones fast enough to catch it, and none of them would be strong enough to fight a shadow anyway. She could stop time and gather her dolls, but even then the Curse might be able to destroy her familiars as easily as it would her. She could repair them if they were broken, but that wouldn't save Sayaka in time.

She frowned, hands clenched. She had no right to ask for help from the other girls, none at all. At least, not for herself. But if it was for Sayaka's sake…. She reached out, seeking the feel of cold-edged knives and a burning heart.

 _'Kyouko, where are you? Sayaka is in danger.'_

'What?'

The reply was startled and fumbling. _'Sayaka's house, what's going on?'_

Instead of answering, Homura cranked her shield to stop time and leapt from the miasma for the river shore.

OoOoO

 _By lengths, the chivalrous knight came upon a lake deep within the mountains. Wide it was and misty, so that she could not see the far-distant shore. She waded in, and by degrees the shifting cloak of mist drew too over the near shore, hiding it from view. The lake before her frothed and rose with great power into the air, as a geyser heard of in those far lands where the earth is broken asunder and the fire of the depths seeks release. The geyser fell back, and upon the water there sat as though on solid ground a lady of the lake, one of those fair folk from the depths who by great wonder seemed to be formed half of human flesh and half like a creature of the sea. Her mien was enraged, and her form clad in armor for war._

The mermaid seized upon the knight at once, and bore her away to a great wheel set upon the lake. The mist fled, and the knight could see far distances unfettered, such that all the waters of all the earth came within her view. And she saw that they all flowed one into another, and there was none set apart from the others.

"GET OUT OF MY HEAD!"

Twin blades whirled about Sayaka as she cut down the shimmering blue silhouettes of the monsters that tried to swarm her from every side. Their forms were almost human; she didn't care. The players tried to press against her and drag her down, but Sayaka moved like fury incarnate and every deathblow disintegrated the familiar's body in a burst of blue light. They could not touch her.

Danger snarled in her mind as she felt the presence of the master moving; a blue platform of shining musical staffs launched Sayaka into the air before the leviathan's blade tore through the crowd of familiars from above, breaking the stone platform the orchestra performed on. The platform crumbled away into the water below, dragging down dozens of players with it. Even as they fell, the whirling, surging music went on resounding throughout the hall without them.

Sayaka kicked off the domed wall and landed on the enormous blade of the monster. She sprinted up it, throwing swords as she went; most snapped off the metal encasing the monster's arms and went pinging off to disappear below, but a few found purchase and stuck in the enemy's flesh. The monster screamed in rage, and Sayaka answered with her own berserk cries. It thrashed, swinging its arm to dislodge Sayaka; she went flying through the broad concert hall, cape fluttering behind her. She instinctively pushed magic out to bend the course of her flight, bringing her even with the water, and Sayaka kicked out to catch the debris floating along the water beneath her.

Cellos, pianos, timpani, she went deftly skipping over them all as she shed momentum until she came to the wall of the pool, up against the orchestra's platform again, which she caught herself against before perching on a line of massive floating pipes from an organ. More insubstantial shimmering players came leaping at her from the orchestra platform just above, but she manifested a straight-edge broadsword taller than she was and shred them from the air as they fell.

The monstrous leviathan came surging at her across the room, twining sinuously as though swimming through the air as deftly as Sayaka herself could move. Four banners snapped in its wake, posted on swords mounted into its armor and spreading out around it as it flew. Runes skittered across the colorful banners, and in her consuming rage Sayaka found that she could read them: _"Pride and despair are the sins of the just."_

The monster's mind throbbed against her own, raw and uncontrolled. Flickers of images pushed their way through like needles, sending sparks of burning light through Sayaka's mind: the devil, winged in purple flame, reaching up with skeletal hands to tear the light from heaven. Sayaka's sword quivered as she gripped it with shaking hands. She raised it, preparing to leap and meet the enemy mid-rush.

"YOU'RE NOT ME!" She screamed it, loud enough to echo around the concert hall and drown out the endless waltz for but a moment. Musical staffs shimmered around her and she flew with a battle scream toward the leviathan; their swords clashed, her two-hander against the tower-sized blade of the mermaid, abyssal blue magic coruscating out from both of them where they met. They strove, their magics pressing against each other with no art or finesse.

And then what? And what if her boundless rage was greater than this mirror held up by from her memories? And if she prevailed against it, then what? Would she go on to throw herself at Homura and see the horror in Madoka's eyes as it all fell apart? Or would she waste away in defeat by the devil's ploys?

The sound of instrument strings snapping cut through the music. Oktavia pushed against her, and Sayaka's own assault gave way. She went plummeting down to hit the water.

OoOoO

"There." Homura passed the binoculars over to Mami, who looked where she was pointing. The blue light of Oktavia's labyrinth entrance had passed into the city of mist, though it was still on the outer row of towers. A few small swarms of wraiths had already made their way back inside the miasma from the city, attracted by the Great Curse's dark energy; they bent their procession to twine around Oktavia as if guarding the shadow.

"You're certain Sayaka is in there?" Mami asked.

"Homura said she saw Sayaka jump in," Madoka said. "She wouldn't lie about something this serious!" Ah, Madoka. Homura fetched Kyouko and then, at the redhead's suggestion, Mami and Nagisa as well. Homura wanted to leave Madoka out of this particular engagement—there was nothing she could do without entering the shadow, and that was out of the question—but Kyouko had insisted on bringing her too. "She's Sayaka's best friend," Kyouko had said, nearly snarling. "It's cruel as hell to leave her out of the loop on this."

"She charged right for the shadow as soon as it fled," Homura said. "I saw her leap into the portal."

"Are you coming with us, Miss Akemi?" Nagisa asked. She'd been peering into the mist with worry plain on her face, but now she gave Homura a look that half pleading, half challenge.

"I… dare not go near the heart of the Great Curse again." Homura reached out, and manifested the amethyst-adorned bow that was Madoka's gift to her in the new world. "But I can clear your path."

"Good enough," Kyouko muttered, bouncing on the balls of her feet. "Now are we going or are we going?"

Homura answered by drawing the bow back and unleashing a barrage at the wraiths.

OoOoO

 _"Look," commanded the mermaid, and the knight looked, and saw that the wheel bore nine great platforms spread along its rim, such that as some rose, others fell toward the waters below, and the lowest dipped beneath the boiling water of the lake._

"Look," commanded the mermaid once again, and the knight looked, and saw that the devil sat upon the wheel, opposite the knight. The devil was a creature of vicious beauty, clad in a raiment of crow's feathers and lounging at her ease.

"Look," commanded the mermaid one final time, and the knight looked, and saw that as the wheel turned, the devil rose toward the ascent and the knight sank toward the waters.

Then the mermaid cursed the name of the knight in anger. "Rota Fortunae raises up and casts down all those Worthies who seek its favor. Are you so assured that you sit idle during the brief day when you might labor, and instead sit awaiting the oblivion of night? Be not so. The devil rises as you fall; why do you not strike her down?

Sayaka drifted. _'All the righteous fury in heaven and hell,'_ she thought, _'And what does it get you?'_

This water was strange; it was hard to tell, but Sayaka felt like she was sinking rather than floating upward. Then again, there was probably enough water in her lungs to sink by now. She'd flipped off her gag instinct once it became obvious she wasn't getting to the surface anytime soon. Staying awake and moving while drowning was somehow worse than fighting with a shattered limb or two; heavier, more oppressive. Darkness flickered at the edge of her vision, filled with scratchy lines that could almost have been slashed with a sword. They twined together, like they were forming letters of some sort, like Oktavia's banner—but she could never catch them head on.

Lights approached her in the deep, a dozen little flames swimming up all together. They twirled about like they were examining her from every angle, and finally they drew close enough to see. They were long fish, if fish had a burning candlewick for a head and a body of thick copper wire twisted together like a chain link fence. Thoughts of her swords or escaping by her musical platforms drifted lethargically through her head, but both were too slow. The firefish darted forward as a swarm, wrapping her limbs against her body with their chain links. Their candlewick heads flared as if signaling, and the mermaid's answering call resounded through the water.

That's right. If all she could really do from here was fail...

Sayaka jerked to the side from an impact, then another, and felt two firefish go slack, their chain fence loosening. A glimpse of crimson hair—Kyouko? No. Another hit as another firefish went limp, and Usotsuki darted around Sayaka wielding two black staffs. She'd lost her hat with the beaded netting somewhere in the water, and her loose hair billowed over wild yellow eyes. _'Come ON, fool angel! You need to move, you troublesome fish!'_

'Go away.'

'Take the damn grief seed Miki, did Mistress Good-For-Nothing say,'

the doll went on, spouting nonsense. _'We get it now, we do! Come on already, there might be a few people who will cry if you get lost swimming. I have to save you, I'm assigned to watch you!'_

Oktavia screamed somewhere in the deep again, closer this time. Usotsuki went on smacking about with her black staffs, fast and precise despite the firefish's attempts to wind away from her. Sayaka shook her head clear and bent forward to get a look at her gem over her navel. Even though Homura had cleansed it moments ago, it was already filling up.

Breath, deep breathes. Wait, no, that wouldn't work; her lungs didn't do more than spasm at the attempt. Whatever. She couldn't go fight the Great Curse on her own because getting herself killed wouldn't be fair to Kyouko. So what the hell was she doing here getting killed here instead? _'You're a goddamn liar, Usotsuki.'_

'Am not!'

She gave an experimental tug at the remaining chain fence. Half the firefish floated loosely in the water, unconscious or dead from Usotsuki's blows. She was halfway free, and _danger monster soulself rage_ Sayaka grabbed Usotsuki with her free hand and shot away with a shimmering blue platform before the armored leviathan's blade tore through them. She pushed off a second and third platform, moving like a torpedo to get as much room between her and Oktavia as possible.

 _'I think I've dreamed from her eyes,'_ Sayaka told the doll. _'Oktavia's. How do I even know that name?'_

'Worry on it later, troublesome fish. Good-For-Nothing will bring the other girls soon.'

Backup. What a funny thing to expect. She didn't really think she deserved it. If she wanted to stall until the others got here—and she didn't think Usotsuki was lying about that—then she needed to hide. Just staying ahead of Oktavia until the others got here was possible too, but riskier—one fuck up dodging and that sword wouldn't cut so much as splatter her. And the light from the concert hall above was too faint to do more than put Sayaka in a dim glow, and did nothing to illuminate anything around her and Usotsuki. How fortunate then, if disconcerting, that she could feel the labyrinth around her.

It was normal to get some sense off the wraiths and their miasma as puella magi fought them, of course—they were built to find these monsters. But now that the berserker fury and the paralyzing despair were both beaten down and only feebly twitching, she had enough clarity of mind to realize she could sense Oktavia's labyrinth around her in far more detail than was normal. She could feel the half-wrecked concert hall above her and the straggling players still on the crumbling remnants of the orchestra platform. She could feel that the submerged cavern with its mountain-weight of dark ocean was many times vaster than the concert hall above. She could feel the schools of firefish darting here and there, and the boiling flood of magic that was Oktavia surging about as it hunted for her.

She could also feel the network of caves weaving through the rock walls of the cavern. She and Usotsuki started downward for the nearest edge, dodging the light from schools of firefish and launching with Sayaka's musical staffs when she thought they were far enough away from anything to get away from it. It quickly got too dark to see anything but the faint gleam of her soul gem, so Sayaka held Usotsuki's hand and guided her, relying entirely on her own magical senses.

The caves, when they came to them, were more than wide enough to allow two human-sized forms to slip inside. They wound deeper through a few passages until Sayaka guessed there was enough rock between them and the entrance to absorb at least a few blows of Oktavia's sword, then came to a stop floating in the dark.

Her worryingly clear awareness of Oktavia's labyrinth also extended as far as letting her feel the edge of its entrance pierced as several puella magi slipped inside. Their presences quickly vanished into the ambient magical noise, but at the moment they crossed the border she distinctly felt Kyouko, Mami, and Nagisa.

 _'Hey everyone.'_ Flippant words, but she didn't try to keep the sense weariness out of her message. She didn't think she could manage it.

 _'Gah, fuck! Don't do that!'_ Kyouko, shouting over Nagisa and Mami's own exclamations. _'Sayaka, where the hell are you?'_

'Hiding with one of the dolls, in caves in the water. The shadow is in the water looking for me.'

'She hasn't flooded the concert hall or turned the lights out yet,'

Nagisa noted.

 _'Nagisa and I have fought this shadow before,'_ Mami sent, not mentioning the origin of the shadow for now. _'We have a strategy for fighting it, and I think having air in the hall and Kyouko along will speed it up. How are you?'_

'I think I drowned to death already, but nothing urgent. We're just floating here.'

'Stay there, then. We'll lay our trap and lure the mermaid into it.'

'Right.'

The others faded, leaving Sayaka to the dark and her second sight of the labyrinth around her. There would be words later, she was sure, mostly shouted. The three of them had kept a laser focus on the immediate goal of beating Oktavia to get Sayaka out of there, but she could feel the anger and hurt crackling around Kyouko with every word that passed between them. She probably thought Sayaka had gone off and deliberately done something stupid, just like Sayaka promised she would. Hell, what even was the difference if she couldn't keep her brain in check long enough to not go berserk at the first sign of her own personal hell torn from her soul and given form before her very eyes? It didn't seem like too much to ask, right?

 _'Angel?'_ Usotsuki asked, breaking into her self-recriminations.

 _'What?'_

'Are you okay?'

Of course she wasn't. Of _course_ she wasn't. But she took Usotsuki's meaning, and pulled a few grief cubes out and pressed them to her gem. She was spiraling hard back there. After she felt the pull of grief from her gem slow and stop, she tossed the spent cubes away to sink to the ground.

 _'Angel,'_ Usotsuki tried again after a moment, _'What is it like? Dreaming from the mermaid's eyes. I've only ever felt it from this end.'_

'I remember the hopelessness. The despair. I remember drifting with no end and no start, listening to the music and clinging to shards of a life I used to have.'

Sayaka shuddered. _'It was the worst way to exist. I don't even remember where I remember it from.'_

'Good-For-Nothing made this world so none of you would have to be like that again.'

'Now that's definitely one of your goddamn lies.'

Sayaka turned her head up toward where she felt Oktavia churning in the water. _'She's up there feeling it for me, isn't she? I'm here now, aren't I?'_

A pause, full of regrets. _'I'm sorry, angel.'_

She didn't know what to say to that, so she didn't. After a moment, she felt Oktavia's sudden pain as an explosion hit her shoulder. The leviathan gave chase to the tiny nuisance blowing bubbles at her, following it up toward the light of the concert hall, and into the net of chains and ribbons that sprung out to catch her as she burst into the air.

Ten seconds and a few enormous explosions later, the labyrinth dissipated around them. Sayaka could feel the magic energy all around her flooding into an enlarged grief cube standing on needlepoint. She also felt herself hit the slippery-but-solid miasma floor of the Great Curse beneath her. She flopped over onto her stomach and turned her head, then started vomiting.

OoOoO

"Or maybe you really thought your big badass self could take it! Is that it? Huh?! Maybe you weren't trying to get yourself killed to piss off everyone, maybe you were just fucking braindead enough to think you had a chance. It's not like you got your ass handed to you twice already charging in the Great Curse—but wait a goddamn second, you did get ground to paste twice already! Lookit that! Guess you're just an idiot!"

Madoka sat on the floor in the hall, hugging her legs to herself. It wasn't supposed to be like this! Sayaka needed their help, not… not this! Kyouko had been in there with Sayaka for almost ten minutes, shouting loud enough the whole neighborhood should have called the police by now. She knew Sayaka and Kyouko were more… aggressive? with each other than really felt natural to her, but that was just how they were. They teased and fought and pushed each and were comfortable with it. That wasn't what was happening in Mami's guest room. Sayaka wasn't even fighting back or trying to justify herself; she just silently taking everything Kyouko screamed at her.

The shouting finally gave way to half a minute of long silence, then Madoka flinched when the door finally swung open and Kyouko came stomping out, brow knit and still in her puella magi outfit. She looked at Madoka, anger still there but clearly chained up under layers of very deliberate self-control. She spoke quietly, and her voice rasped. "Hey, kid. Take care of her, will you? Because I can't, not now. I just… I need to get out of here. I can't deal with this shit now."

"This started because someone wandered off," Madoka said as Kyouko walked by her. She flinched as the other girl stopped in place. "I mean, well… where are you going? Don't just vanish like she did. Please."

"Twintail's place," Kyouko decided after a minute. "Give me her address, will you?" Madoka fumbled for the address in her phone for a second, then showed it to Kyouko, who punched it into her own.

Without another word, Kyouko left Madoka behind and stomped off. She passed Nagisa, who had retreated to the kitchen to hide and didn't try to stop her, but then found Mami waiting at the front door with arms crossed. Damn it, she shoulda gone out a window. "Move it," Kyouko growled.

"None of us should be alone when we're upset," Mami said as though she wasn't talking about anyone in particular. She probably thought it was a nice little shot at being diplomatic.

"I told Pinkie where I'm going, she can find me. Move it."

"Kyouko…" Mami looked at her with more pity and disappointment than she was ready to put up with right now. Who the hell did Mami think she was, her mom? She didn't need a replacement. "I feel like I need to say just one thing first. I can see coping with Sayaka is… difficult. And I'm likely not saying anything you don't know already. We've both seen enough to know she's involved with matters that are very," Mami struggled for words. "Complex, I suppose. She even claimed she was looking into damage to the Law of Cycles, and Kyubey seemed to believe her. I'll be the first to admit I didn't think much of her seeming recklessness at first, and I still don't understand what she's struggling with. But even if she can't tell us, she needs our patience, not our anger."

"Patience? You want me to be patient? You want me to be fucking patient?" Last time Kyouko punched a wall she didn't just go through the drywall, she went through the wooden stud behind it, so experience kept her from doing the same to Mami's nice entrance hallway. But it was a close thing. "What the fuck do you think I've been doing for goddamn months? You know what she told me today? She straight up told me this wasn't going to stop. She said she was going to keep being a dumbass doing stupid shit, and she was going to keep me from getting dragged in, like we're somehow not all stuck in it already. Then the very first thing she does after she leaves is run off and get herself halfway killed again. So you know what? Tonight, I'm going to honor Sayaka's wishes and let her deal with this shit on her own, because if I stick around here I'm going to shove a damn spear down her throat. _Move_."

Mami looked like some combination of too weary for words, disappointed, understanding, and ready to ribbon her to the ceiling, but she moved anyway. Kyouko wasted no time in making stompy tracks out the door. She went roofhopping for awhile, no destination in mind, just pushing herself to move as fast and hard as she could. If the bored useless citizens of Mitakihara were sticking their heads out the windows and looking up for kicks and giggles or if she was leaving divots on top of people's apartments, it wasn't her problem unless they tracked her down to whine about it. Let Kyubey intercept them, he was still useful for keeping their secrets secret.

Frustratingly, she couldn't even work herself into a proper shaky exhaustion—boosting herself with magic had become too instinctual to get more than a little winded doing something as easy as vaulting over the city for half an hour or so. Eventually she gave it up, swung by a couple stores to pick some stuff up, then headed for Homura's place.

It turned out the girl lived in a private little apartment in a decent part of town. Old-fashioned wrought streetlamps lined the smooth stone-paved walkway in front of a wedge-shaped front where two streets came together at a sharp angle. Kyouko couldn't tell if the building, along the front anyway, was two or three floors or two-and-a-half or whatever, and she could see a mismatched set of higher rooftops and quasi-towers peaking out the top, like someone had taken a perfectly serviceable building and shoved on a dozen independent extensions with no plan or reason. Seemed like everything Twintails touched had to be a bit off. Bar the weird bits, it looked like it fell out of some postcard from sometime last century, some little place you'd find in a movie set in Paris or some shit. Definitely didn't belong here with all the ultramodern penthouses sitting right in the skyline behind it. She made her way inside, wandered the halls until she found Homura's apartment number and the understated engraved stone nameplate that said 'Akemi' and mashed the buzzer.

After a moment, the door opened a few inches, held back by a durable-looking security chain that Kyouko somehow completely failed to be surprised by. The wide-eyed shock that Homura gave her through the narrow opening was a little less expected. "Why are you here? Why aren't you with Miki?" Homura asked. She sounded, in her near-monotone sort of way, like the sky was falling and she was figuring out who to blame.

"I'm taking a night off for the sake of preventing a murder," Kyouko said back. "Can I crash here?" Homura got herself back under control and gave Kyouko a flat stare that still managed to not hide her displeasure at all. Kyouko gave her a cocky grin. "C'mon, just think how cheesed off Sayaka'll be when she hears I ditched her for the bastard she wants to shank. Can you really pass that up?"

The door swung closed. As it did, Kyouko was pretty sure she caught Homura rolling her eyes for a second there. Funny, she thought Homura'd be in on messing with Blue. The door swung back open, all the way this time, and Homura stepped aside.

Kyouko hefted one of the bags she'd brought with her. "I brought some stuff if you're hungry."

"The kitchen is the first opening on the right, you can drop it there. I'll… stop by in a second." Homura herself went deeper down the entry hallway, disappearing around a twist.

The kitchen was a compact little affair with an attached dining room in front of it, but the dining room didn't look like it'd actually been used for eating at any point in the recent past. The table, shoved up against the wall, wasn't that large to start with even before she took into account the piles of books and what looked like gun maintenance kits clogging things up. She could just picture Homura eating over the sink instead of bothering to sit down. Or standing at the counter, there was a spot clear but for a few crumbs. Kyouko snooped through the kitchen cabinets a bit. Apparently, Homura subsisted on bulk stock instant ramen, boxes of nutrient bars, and a small tower of vitamin bottles. She was almost grateful to discover that the cabinet with the crate of bottled water also had a bulk package of single-serve milk tea boxes. She popped the fridge open; mostly empty, but there was at least some leftover takeout yakisoba in there.

Kyouko added her own offerings, simple but better than this. A bag of oranges, the little ones that were easy to peel. A few apples. A loaf of nice thick wheat bread she picked up fresh from a bakery, along with a small tub of butter and a bottle of honey. She hung onto the second bag she brought in, which had two boxes of takeout spaghetti from an Italian place she liked dragging Sayaka to. After a second's thought, she grabbed a few oranges and tucked them in with the spaghetti.

Homura slipped into the kitchen from wherever she went and wordlessly crooked a finger. Kyouko followed back out into the main hall. "The bathroom is down the left hall, first door on the right," Homura said as they passed it. She had that disinterested face she always wore, probably force of habit. "There are unopened toothbrushes and such in the second drawer on the sink."

They went back the way Homura had first disappeared to on her own, until Homura pushed open the door to a room much larger than Kyouko expected this little apartment to have. Just how much of the complex did Homura's place take up? The room was mostly dark, with dim lights and candles floating along the walls and across the ceiling; a scythed pendulum swung through the air. Which was pretty badass, Kyouko thought, not to mention metal as fuck, but she rather hoped it and the floating candles were holograms. Homura was weird enough without adding extensive creepy interior decorating to her hobbies.

She had up holoscreens against the wall too, though they looked very sparse like Homura had shut off a bunch before letting Kyouko in the room. There were a few pictures of them and the rest of the girls, all from the dress up photoshoot at Magicland today. Most of the rest looked like surveillance photos of the Great Curse, and who knows how Homura got those. Kyouko didn't think the miasma would show up on muggle satellite in the first place.

"I don't have a proper guest room, but there are couches here," Homura added, waving vaguely to the multi-ringed arrangement of couches that ate up most of the floor space while Kyouko paced through them looking around the room. "I suppose you can get television on the holoscreens there. I think I have some spare blankets somewhere too. Don't expect me to hang about all night to entertain you."

Kyouko gave her a big grin, the sort that deliberately shows off her fang. "Aww lookit that, Twintail's making sure I settle in proper and being all tsundere about it. Ain't it adorable!"

Homura gave her a mild effort at a withering look. "Kyouko. Why are you here?"

"I told ya, Sayaka's pissed me off too hard, I'm not staying around her tonight."

"You could just as easily have gone back to your church for the night. Isn't that what you're most accustomed to?"

Homura instinctively caught the orange Kyouko tossed at her. "Had to drop by and say thanks," Kyouko said. Homura looked back down at the orange like it was giving her stage fright all of a sudden. She was a mess, wasn't she? Cold by habit, freaked out kid on the inside. "You don't like Sayaka much, but you pulled through for her anyway back there. So, you know, thanks." Kyouko let the sincerity hang in the air for a second, just as long as she could stand, before smacking it on the back of the head with a snigger. "It kinda spoiled your icy bitch routine though. You're gonna have a bad time convincing any of us if you try to start that shit up again."

Homura looked uncertain how to respond to that, and shrugged slightly. "She didn't go in there to pick a fight." Kyouko froze. "She was sitting at the edge of the miasma crying when I found her. She didn't intend to go deeper."

Kyouko stood for a few long seconds, still frozen, as worked out the most reasonable way to respond to that. " _FUCK!_ " Homura, nonplussed, began peeling the orange. She frowned at the skin, wondering what to do with it, since there didn't seem to be a garbage in the room. "Goddamn fuck it shit damn fuck," Kyouko managed as she sank onto the inner ring of couches, face in her hands. "And I went all nuclear on her!"

Homura's shield popped into being for a second, long enough for her to shove the orange peel inside. She ate one segment, obviously paying careful attention to its taste, and handed another segment to Kyouko. "Are you going back tonight?"

Kyouko took the orange and chewed it while she thought. "Nah, I'll apologize tomorrow. I try it now and I'll just ram a spear through my own face and die of embarrassment. Madoka's with her, she'll be fine for now."

"As you like."

Kyouko pulled the boxes of spaghetti out and plopped them on the table at the center of the couch rings, pushing one towards the side closest to Homura, nudging the lid open as she did to reveal the offerings in all their hot, cheap takeout glory. "There's this channel that runs cheesy old black and white horror movies Sunday nights. You wanna stick around?" Homura hesitated, but didn't move away; her gaze fixed somewhere halfway between Kyouko and the spaghetti. Kyouko leaned in and caught her eye. "Hey, you said you wanna get on better with all of us, right? That doesn't just mean kicking wraiths' teeth in together. It's okay, I'm not gonna bite." After a second Homura nodded and, like she was opening up a chest of fabled gold, sat down across from Kyouko and took the spaghetti.

OoOoO

Madoka pushed her way into her house, carrying a duffel bag of Sayaka's clothes and sundries. Her best friend followed in after her. It was school tomorrow, but talking Sayaka and Sayaka's mom into a sleepover at Madoka's house was simple. She just had to point out to Miki Miho that Sayaka hadn't been over to see Mama and Papa at all since the Kaname family got back to Japan. As for Sayaka… even easier. It was more like telling her to come over and then packing a bag for her while her best friend sat there doing nothing to object.

She'd hoped to get Sayaka up to her room right away, but found Mama waiting for them in a chair by the stairs like she'd expected that. Why'd she ever talked her parents into putting extra chairs in the hallways, anyway?

Mama stood up, smiling and coming forward. "Sayaka, it's been awhile. I've talked with your mom a few times, but you haven't been over since we moved back."

"Yeah it has, thanks for having me over, Mrs. Kaname." Sayaka's return smile didn't hold up as well. Her regeneration had already fixed the damage caused by having lungs full of water, and cycling her transformation had dried her off, not even leaving her hair a little damp. All the signs of the battle with Oktavia, wiped away literally by magic, and not a speck of the real damage actually fixed.

"Oh, none of that now, Mrs. Kaname is my mother's name. Call me Junko, or I'll even let you get away with 'Mom' like you used to."

"Right," Sayaka knocked her head with her knuckles. "Forgot I used to do that."

"Ah, that reminds me, we need to have you and Miho over for dinner sometime soon. So how's life treating you, kid?"

"I'm… I'm great. Can't complain."

"Hmm."

Sayaka was going through the motions, but she wasn't selling it very well—and Mama wasn't buying it either, that much was obvious from the considering stare that made Sayaka squirm. "C-could you take the bag up to my room?" Madoka asked Sayaka, jumping in and passing the bag of Sayaka's things over. "All the way up the stairs and the last door on the right. It's the super pink room."

"Right, I'll… see you later," Sayaka agreed, looking a little relieved, and took off.

Mama arched an eyebrow at that. Running interference to get Sayaka away from Mama felt… bizarre. Wrong, and she shrank as Mama's considering stare moved from Sayaka's retreating back to her. She'd expect that Homura or Kyouko would want to get away from adults—from people in general really—if they were upset. But from what she remembered Sayaka loved her parents, trusted them and enjoyed having them around. They certainly used to keep dinnertime conversations going far longer than dinner when she had Sayaka over. And yet, if Mama started to poke around trying to figure out what was wrong with her friend, what could they possibly tell her?

Arms crossed, Mama finally said something, but not a reprimand like Madoka expected. "You have fun with your friends at Magicland today?"

"Mmhmm," she nodded.

"You missed dinner after you got back," Mama said, still very blandly. Madoka liked to think of that carefully neutral tone as her "CEO firing voice." "And Tomo and I didn't hear you leave the house the second time."

"I'm sorry, I left in a hurry."

Mama nodded at the stairs Sayaka just went up. "She's upset."

"I… heard from Kyouko." Which was entirely right, Kyouko and Homura appeared in her room in timestop to tell her what happened. "She and Sayaka had a big fight, and she didn't think Sayaka took it well." That… was more a half-truth, really, they did have a fight after they found Sayaka again, but it was inevitable the moment Sayaka went back in the Great Curse alone. Madoka couldn't help but wince a little anyway.

Mama frowned faintly, staring through her with a parent's all-knowing sight. "You're a good girl, Madoka, and I don't think you're lying to me. But you're not telling the truth, either."

She flinched, looking at the floor. She scrambled for… some excuse, some justification, something honest to give, any of it. "It isn't lying if I'm leaving out the bits you'd never believe," she managed.

"You don't usually get that technical with the truth. I thought I'd earned more credit with you than that, too."

She was right, and Madoka knew it. She'd never been afraid to tell Mama everything before, never believed there was anything that had to be hers and hers alone. She'd heard a few of her friends and classmates thought it was weird for her to be as open with her parents as she was. From what she'd seen of them, she couldn't picture Hitomi even trying to explain to her parents how tired she was of the constant parade of lessons and societies and culture. But why would Madoka want that sort of relationship with her parents? They'd never been there to force her one way or another. They'd always been there to help her.

"There's… there's a grudge Sayaka can't get past," Madoka began, speaking vaguely. "Or maybe… or maybe she wants to do the right thing, but feels like she can't? And I don't know why she thinks the thing she wants to do is right, and she won't tell me. I don't know what my best friend is thinking, Mama."

"Wouldn't that be a terrible thing," Mama said ruefully.

"Mama?"

She shook her head, pushing on. "And Kyouko disagrees with Sayaka about what the right thing to do is? And you disagree with her, too?"

Madoka flinched at that. Mama closed her eyes, two fingers resting lightly against the bridge of her nose. That was what Madoka called the "CEO can't fire you yet but has the paperwork filled out and framed for that blessed day" pose. "Is anybody pregnant?" Mama asked.

"What? No! Of course not!"

"Is anyone touching hard drugs?"

"I wouldn't… I'd never…" Madoka sputtered.

"Would you friends?" Mama asked pointedly.

"No, they aren't!" she almost cried back.

"Do any of your friends need a doctor? Are they being bullied?" By now Mama was running down a list like she'd memorized it. Maybe she had at some point, her and Papa deciding when they'd step in on their daughter's life. "Is their home life abusive? Are there police involved?"

"No! No, no no!"

She was about ready to die of shame. That Mama would think she would… she'd never get dragged into… she was a good girl! Even Mama called her that all the time! She'd raised her to tell the truth and follow rules and not cause trouble without a good reason. She burned red-faced under Mama's eyes as the silence drew out.

But…

But Sayaka had been raised practically the same way, to be a good person and look out for those in need, and she needed help more than any of them. And Kyouko never asked to end up on the streets, and Mami didn't set out to be an orphan living alone, and Homura… she only wanted to help her, and that willingness dragged Homura into this never ending hell in the first place.

Trouble didn't care whether you were staying inside the lines or not. Considering that, Mama was right to worry.

"In that case, if you really don't want adults prying," Mama said, "I'll stay out of it."

Madoka blinked. "You… will? Just like that?"

"If there's no desperate reason for me to step in, then I'm not going to try to force you." She shook her head, unfolded her arms, and waved back toward the kitchen. "Tomo put leftovers in the fridge, there's plenty for you and Sayaka if you're hungry."

"Okay…" She felt dazed, like she'd just been struck between the eyes. Mama was great and she loved her… but arguing with her was kind of scary too.

"Madoka."

"Yes!"

Mama watched her a second, warmer than a moment ago, with her wry little smile. She clapped a hand onto her daughter's shoulder. "It seems like you and Sayaka are having a big disagreement of some sort, but your first instinct is to pull her closer anyway. I'm proud of you for that." She gave her a push toward the stairs. "Go on, she's waiting for you."

Madoka stopped up the first few steps and turned around. "Thank you!" Mama just waved her off and ducked through the entry to the kitchen. After a second, Madoka heard the distinct sound of the liquor cabinet doors opening. Maybe she'd given Mama enough to stress about after all.

She reached her room and stood in front of the door, hesitating. And here was another scary conversation, one she was going to be just as lost in, and one with higher stakes. She touched her pocket, full of grief cubes that Mami gave her earlier. She didn't like carrying such a reminder of their trouble with her. With Sayaka in the state she was, she also wouldn't be caught dead without them. She took a deep breath and pushed the door open.

She had three visitors, not one. Sayaka sat on the wood floor, back up against her bed. Usotsuki, still missing her hat, laid on the bed behind Sayaka whispering to her; Sayaka looked like she didn't mind. Manuke, sitting at the computer desk and kicking her feet forlornly, let out a near-squawk and jumped up as soon as she spotted the door opening. She rushed over to Madoka and threw a desperate hug around her, which Madoka caught and returned. She'd gotten used to having Manuke drop in and out for card games and stories. After the hug pulled back, she ran a finger over the side of Manuke's face, where Reiketsu had thrown a rock at her; the chip was patched over seamlessly now, well enough that she couldn't even see the damage. Homura fixed it, she guessed.

Manuke leaned up on tippy toes, normally bright eyes spinning with gray. "You'll help her, won't you, pink girl?"

Madoka brushed some of the orange-red hair off Manuke's forehead, tucking back into her hood. "I'm going to try," she promised.

It looked like Mama had already brought up the spare futon, though she hadn't set it out properly. Madoka busied herself with that, trying to stall as long as possible. Task eventually complete, she walked back to the others. Usotsuki broke off, and both she and her charge looked up.

"May I, um, Sayaka, may I see your gem?" she asked.

Without argument or complaint, Sayaka shifted her soul gem from ring to egg and handed it freely to Madoka.

The shimmering blue gem in her hands was still mostly clear, but even as she watched she thought it was filling ever so slowly with the sad black corruption from a knot of darkness at its core. Or she was imagining it? The slow swirling of light and shadow like an abandoned snowglobe made it hard to be sure whether the balance was changing. Either way, Sayaka wasn't in danger now.

This was the second time one of her friends willingly and freely handed Madoka her soul gem, wasn't it? Both of them troubled, fatalistic, and dear to her.

She passed the gem back to Sayaka, who shifted it back to a ring. "Thank you," Madoka said, almost a whisper, trying to put into those two words all the feeling making her heart swell to bursting right now, the thankfulness that Sayaka would trust her and the desperate need for her best friend to be alright and not leave her.

But Sayaka and Homura's circumstances were completely different, too. For one thing—the most important right now—Madoka was certain she knew what Homura needed. Homura needed absolution, she needed permission to be happy again, she needed someone who could welcome her no matter what stains were there on her past. But Sayaka?

What did Sayaka need from her? Sayaka's world was crumbling, badly enough that she was projecting shadows, and Madoka still couldn't even wrap her head around why. All she knew—from the way Sayaka rebutted all her friends over and over again when they tried to pry—was that she didn't want to talk about her secrets.

"Do you want to watch a movie?" she asked, feeling like a cop out. "Or I could grab the cards and we could play games. I'd suggest braiding hair, but Hitomi's not here, so…" She flounced her shortish pigtails; Sayaka's hair, of course, was even shorter.

"Movie's fine," Sayaka said, a little hoarse.

"What do you want to watch?" Madoka went to her desk computer and started fiddling. "Hang on, I'll bring up the family library, or we could rent something…."

"Anything's fine. You choose."

"…Okay." After a moment's hesitation, she picked one of her recent favorites, pushed the monitor to the edge of the desk, and set the handful of grief cubes next to it. A few cushions from the bed for comfort, and she plopped down next to Sayaka, legs close enough to brush. She wanted Sayaka to at least have tangible evidence that her friend was right here, immediately accessible and present. Usotsuki moved away from them and into a corner of the room where she couldn't see the computer screen; Manuke shrugged and claimed the abandoned spot on the bed.

Madoka snuck a little closer during the opening, taking advantage of her friend's height to turn Sayaka's shoulder into a convenient headrest. Sayaka almost certainly wasn't paying attention to the movie though, judging from the tremors that ran through her every few minutes which she tried so hard to still. She wasn't even paying enough attention to riff her way through the movie, like Sayaka always did with almost any movie. By the time they got to the bit of the movie where Casey Newton declares herself an optimist, she couldn't fight it off any longer and started crying with quiet, low snuffles.

Going on instinct, Madoka got up and flipped the movie off before shoving Sayaka away from the bed just far enough to slip in behind her. Sayaka was taller, sure, but Madoka pushed until Sayaka slid forward enough for Madoka to tuck her head over her friend's and hug her from behind. It was an awkward position, with Sayaka halfway between sitting and lying down, but she wasn't going to budge.

"I can't do anything. I can't even fail right," Sayaka moaned into her hands. "I can't even get myself killed, it wouldn't be right, not for you and Kyouko. She's won, and I can't do anything but hurt people I love."

Madoka didn't say anything yet, she just squeezed tighter and laid her cheek against Sayaka's hair, trying to let her friend feel that she was here for her.

"There's nothing _you_ can do either," Sayaka said with a touch of bitterness, hearing Madoka's intent clearly.

"I'll wait. I'll listen. Even if that's all I can do for you."

"You made your choice, you gave yourself to _her_."

As much as she meant to just listen and be there, Madoka couldn't help but bite back at that. "I still don't understand why you think that's so wrong!" Her hands were trembling, her voice was shaking. "Why is it bad she wants to be friends with us now? Do you want everyone to keep fighting?"

"No! But not like this! Not like…." Sayaka took a shuddery breath. "I can't prove anything. None of you would believe me, you'd think I'm crazy if I said it. You think I'm crazy already."

That seemed like the sort of thing Madoka ought to deny, but she wasn't sure how. Besides, Sayaka's walls settling in place again, trapping her in her own chosen failures. She wasn't going to listen. Madoka shifted her arms to cradle Sayaka's head; it was the only thing she could think of.

Sayaka suddenly jerked upward; Madoka hissed in pain and let go as her friend's enhanced strength wrenched her arms. Distracted, Sayaka breathed, "You already think I'm crazy."

Across the room, Usotsuki sat up sharply. "Angel," she said, a warning.

"What?" Sayaka demanded, her fire suddenly returned full-force. "More threats? Will you make up your damn mind whether you're here to help or keep me in line?"

The enchanted girl sighed, eyes dull. When Usotsuki spoke again, it was plainly, without any of the embellishment or sing-songy teasing Madoka had heard from her before, without games or lies. "I'll have to tell Good-For-Nothing if you do this. I won't have a choice."

"Then tell her! What'll she do to me?" Sayaka shot back. "What _else_ can she do to me? She's not as vicious as she pretended at first, is she? And it doesn't matter if I forget again, not once Madoka knows. What can she do to me?"

Usotsuki turned away and hugged herself.

"Sayaka?" Madoka tried. "What's going on? Tell me what?"

Sayaka pulled herself out of Madoka's hug and turned around, sitting so they faced each other. "Madoka, I…" Sayaka didn't move back very far though, and looked like she wanted to dive back into the hug; there was a flood of locked-off secrets banging at the dam she'd built around them, and Madoka could tell she was terrified. "I don't… I don't belong here."

"Here? You mean you should be back at your house with Kyouko?"

Sayaka laughed, shook her head. "No, no, _here_. This _world_. I was somewhere else, part of something else. This earth, my life here, it's all a lie! I was, I don't know, in heaven maybe. Not here, not living this life. Until she pulled me away from it."

It took Madoka a second to realize she meant that _Homura_ had done that; she opened her mouth to object without thinking, but Sayaka pressed a hand to her mouth. "No, please, let me finish, I should've told you at the start, I should have trusted you more, I should never have played her game in the first place. I couldn't say anything for so long, I need to get it out."

She pulled her hand off; seeing Madoka silent again, Sayaka went on. "I… the very first thing I remember and know is my memory was… standing just off the creek on the way to school. And, and _she_ was there. We were arguing, I was furious with her. Akemi ruined something, everything, and I was ready to fight her for what she did. But the she… reached into my mind and soul and squeezed them until they tore in half. She took everything I remembered about the world before and threw it away, put a new life where the holes went. But it doesn't feel the same. Everything about my life before feels gray and wrong and alien, even though it's in my head. Akemi isn't just puella magi. She's something else, something more. Stronger, older, she has powers she hides from all of us."

"But… but I remember you," Madoka struggled out. "We grew up together. I remember you, you're my best friend!"

Sayaka reached out and put one hand on Madoka's face. She smiled, tender and frightened. "That's because… that's because you were there too." Madoka stiffened. "You were there with us, you saved us from despair, you were the greatest of us. I owed you my soul and I fought at your side. You don't belong here either. Akemi tore you down and did to you what she did to me. You're not supposed to be here."

No. No, that's… Madoka took a breath; it didn't help. Homura wouldn't… Her hands shook; the room spun around her. Half-remembered nightmares and a hundred little moments of deja vu came creeping over her. "But Homura saved me! I… I kept dying and she stopped it…." Something told her that didn't make any sense the way she said it; she tried again. "She's a time traveler. Time magic, like you said! She stops time. But, but she rewinds it too, and she… she kept trying to save me because I kept wishing to be puella magi and kept dying. I was too weak. But I was here! She couldn't do that if I wasn't here!"

"No, no, that's not right, that doesn't fit with what I've put back together. I…." Sayaka stopped, struggling with herself. "Maybe she did, maybe that's in there somewhere, somehow. I don't know, she wasn't always our enemy. She loves you. I don't hate her. I can't. She was one of us. But you were the strongest of us, not some broken soul who needed saving, not what I remember. She tore you down from heaven, it's the only reason I could be so furious back then. I named her the devil and swore to fight her, you have to believe she earned that!"

By now, Sayaka's words came as though Madoka heard them through a long tube, squeezed out and choked. She wavered, head bobbing up as though hanging off her body by a string.

"You don't believe me, do you? My horrible secrets that I've kept all this time, you and Kyouko begged me to stop bearing them myself." Sayaka laughed shakily. "And now you're afraid to believe me."

Madoka couldn't bring herself to say anything, one way or the other. She reached out, hands mechanical and sluggish, and grabbed Sayaka's own, squeezing desperately.

"It's okay." Sayaka squeezed back just as tight. "I get it. I lost track how many times I cried myself to sleep wishing it weren't true. My whole life here is a lie shoved in my head. I don't want to believe that either." Sayaka sniffled again, her sudden fire spent. "That's it. I really am done now. I told you. This is all I can do. You don't have to worry about me anymore. I won't go picking fights. I won't charge off alone anymore. If… you still want me to get along with Akemi, I will."

Nothing else to say, Sayaka slid against the bed next to her. Madoka found herself falling sideways for an eternity until she passed through the scant inches and landed again on Sayaka's shoulder. Sayaka was trembling, or was that her? Sayaka was definitely crying, quiet and sniffling. But then, so was Madoka, a stream of silent tears rolling down her face as she clung to one of the two girls she'd believed she could trust no matter what.

OoOoO


End file.
